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Jack Pettigrew

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(Redirected from John Douglas Pettigrew) Australian neuroscientist (1943–2019)

John Douglas "Jack" Pettigrew
Born(1943-10-02)October 2, 1943
Wagga Wagga, Australia
DiedMay 7, 2019(2019-05-07) (aged 75)
Kempton, Tasmania, Australia
EducationUniversity of Sydney (MBBS)
Spouse Rona ​(m. 1968)​
Children3

John Douglas "Jack" Pettigrew (2 October 1943 - 7 May 2019) was an Australian neuroscientist. He was Emeritus Professor of Physiology and Director of the Vision, Touch and Hearing Research Centre at the University of Queensland in Australia.

Research

Pettigrew's research interest was in comparative neuroscience. He studied a variety of different birds and mammals with modern neuronal tracing techniques to unravel principles of brain organization. He was the chief proponent of the flying primate hypothesis, which was based on the similarity between the brains of megabats and primates. Special emphasis was placed on the visual, auditory and somatosensory systems.

Pettigrew was the first person to clarify the neurobiological basis of stereopsis when he described neurones sensitive to binocular disparity. Later, he discovered that owls have independently evolved a system of binocular neurones like those found in mammals.

Pettigrew showed evidence for a role for non-visual pathways in the phenomenon of developmental neuroplasticity during the postnatal critical period.

Pettigrew used binocular rivalry as an assay for interhemispheric switching, whose rhythm is altered in bipolar disorder.

Honours and awards

Pettigrew’s scientific work was recognized by several honours and awards, including becoming a Fellow of the Royal Society of London (FRS)in 1987, becoming a Fellow of the fellow of the Australian Academy of Science (FAAS) in the same year, and being awarded the Centenary Medal in 2001 for service to Australian society and science in phylogeny.

Other notable activity

In the 1960s and 1970s, Pettigrew was an accomplished rock climber. His most notable climb came in 1965 when together with Bryden Allen, John Davis, and David Witham he was the first to climb the 562 m (1,844 ft) high Ball's Pyramid, the tallest volcanic stack in the world.

References

  1. Who's Who in Australia 2013, Crown Content, 2012.
  2. ^ "Emeritus Prof Jack Pettigrew". Archived from the original on 24 July 2007. Retrieved 7 March 2007.
  3. "John Pettigrew | Royal Society". Archived from the original on 10 May 2019. Retrieved 10 May 2019.
  4. "Australian Honours Search Facility". Archived from the original on 10 May 2019. Retrieved 6 July 2024.
  5. Donald E Mitchell, The Man from Ironbark: a profile of Professor Jack Pettigrew FRS, flamboyant sensory systems researcher and recipient of the H Barry Collin Research Medal Archived 2 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Clinical and Experimental Optometry 94, pp. 494–501 (2011)

External links

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