The Michael Prize

Presented biennially, this prize was originally set up in 1963 to stimulate epilepsy research among young scientists in Germany. It has now developed into an international award for the best scientific and clinical research, promoting further developments in epileptology. The prize fund is Euro 15,000.

The winners of The Michael Prize in 2007 are Dr Christophe Bernard and Dr Alon Friedman.

Dr Bernard has devoted himself to translational epilepsy research. He has established an interdisciplinary group aimed at addressing the mechanisms of seizure genesis and propagation in animal models of temporal lobe epilepsy. His main focus is to study the reorganization of the hippocampus CA1 region in epileptic animals to determine the changes that could be considered pro-epileptic vs. those that are compensatory changes and perhaps even antiepileptic in nature.

Dr Friedman is a neuroscientist at the Ben Gurion University of the Negev. During his medical studies he developed an interest in mechanisms regulating excitability of cortical neurons and epileptogenesis. During his post-doctorate work he realized that the blood brain barrier can be partially opened under extreme stress conditions. This primed his interest during training as a neurosurgeon and he identified a number of clinical conditions associated with an open blood brain barrier.