New Haven, Conn. — The 2025 Gruber Neuroscience Prize will be awarded to Edward F. Chang, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), in recognition of his pioneering research uncovering how the human brain enables speech. His work has not only revealed how the brain encodes the sounds and movements of spoken language, but has also led to the development of the first successful speech neuroprosthesis to restore communication in individuals with paralysis.
Dr. Chang’s research stands out for both its technical sophistication and its profound clinical impact. It combines high-precision neurosurgery with advanced neuroscience and human-based brain mapping to uncover functions that are uniquely human. His discoveries have opened an entirely new field of neuroscience focused on decoding and restoring speech from brain activity.
Conducted with conscious patients undergoing neurosurgical procedures, Dr. Chang’s work mapped the neural systems responsible for both speech comprehension and production. This includes how the brain processes vowels, consonants, and vocal pitch, how it filters background noise, and how it orchestrates the vocal tract movements needed for speech.
These insights made it possible to create a brain-computer interface that enables paralyzed individuals to translate their neural activity directly into words. By bypassing damaged speech pathways, the neuroprosthesis has restored communication in patients who had lost the ability to speak due to stroke, injury, or disease.
“Chang’s research has advanced the field in neuroscience in multiple ways,” says Joshua Sanes. Jeff C. Tarr Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard and chair of the Selection Advisory Board to the Prize. “First, his work has helped elucidate the neural code that is responsible for speech recognition and speech production, which has been a long-running challenge because it can only be studied in humans. Second, his work is providing new hope for patients suffering from devastating conditions that rob them of their ability to communicate.”
The Gruber Neuroscience Prize, which includes a $500,000 award, will be presented to Chang on November 16 at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in San Diego, CA.
Additional Information
In addition to the cash award, the recipient will receive a gold laureate pin and a citation that reads:
The Gruber Foundation proudly presents the 2025 Neuroscience Prize to Edward F. Chang for his groundbreaking research on how the human brain encodes speech.
As a neurosurgeon-scientist, Chang has produced the first detailed maps of the brain structures involved in both producing and understanding spoken language. He pioneered the use of high-resolution brain recordings in awake human patients, uncovering how individual speech sounds are represented in the auditory cortex. He also completed the first functional mapping of the neurons that control the larynx, tongue, and lips during speech—laying the foundation for a neural understanding of articulation.
Edward Chang has been at the forefront of developing speech prosthetics powered by brain-computer interfaces, enabling paralyzed patients to communicate using large-vocabulary, real-time synthetic speech. His work has transformed how we understand spoken communication, energized an entire field of neuroscience, and brought renewed hope to thousands of people who have lost the ability to speak.
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The Neuroscience Prize honors scientists for major discoveries that have advanced the understanding of the nervous system.
Laureates of the Gruber Neuroscience Prize:
2024: Cornelia I. Bargmann and Gerald M. Rubin, for fundamental research and leadership in the use of invertebrate genetic model organisms
2023: Huda Akil, for contributions to identification of neural circuitry and molecular mechanisms that underlie neuropsychiatric conditions
2022: Larry Abbott, Emery Neal Brown, Terrence Sejnowski, and Haim Sompolinsky, computational and theoretical neuroscience contributions
2021: Christine Petit and Christopher A. Walsh, for elucidating the genetic and molecular mechanisms that underlie human neurodevelopmental hereditary disorders
2020: Friedrich Bonhoeffer, Corey Goodman and Marc Tessier-Lavigne, for elucidating developmental mechanisms that guide axons to their targets
2019: Joseph S. Takahashi, for pioneering work on the molecular and genetic basis of circadian rhythms in mammals
2018: Ann M. Graybiel, Okihide Hikosaka and Wolfram Schultz, for pioneering work in the study of the structure, organization and functions of the basal ganglia
2017: Joshua Sanes, for groundbreaking discoveries about synapses, transforming our understanding of how the human brain functions
2016: Mu-Ming Poo, for his pioneering and inspiring work on synaptic plasticity
2015: Carla Shatz and Michael Greenberg, for their elucidation of the molecular mechanisms through which neural activity controls wiring and plasticity of the brain
2014: Thomas Jessell, for his pioneering work on the differentiation of spinal cord neurons and their wiring into networks
2013: Eve Marder, for her contributions to understanding how circuit dynamics and behavior arise from the properties of component neurons and their synaptic connections
2012: Lily and Yuh Nung Jan, for their fundamental contributions to molecular neurobiology
2011: Huda Y. Zoghbi, for her pioneering work on revealing the genetic underpinnings of neurological disorders
2010: Robert H. Wurtz, for pioneering work on neural bases of visual processing in primates
2009: Jeffrey C. Hall, Michael Rosbash, and Michael Young, for revealing the gene-driven mechanism that controls rhythm in the nervous system
2008: John O’Keefe, for discovering place cells, which led to important findings in cognitive neuroscience
2007: Shigetada Nakanishi, for pioneering research into communication between nerve cells in the brain
2006: Masao Ito and Roger Nicoll, for work on the molecular and cellular bases of memory and learning
2005: Masakazu Konishi and Eric Knudsen, for work on the neural basis of sound localization
2004: Seymour Benzer, for applying the tools of molecular biology and genetics to the fruit fly, Drosophila, and linking individual genes to their behavioral phenotypes
The Society for Neuroscience partners with the Foundation on the Prize and nominates the members of the Selection Advisory Board that chooses the Prize recipients. Its members are:
Joanne Berger-Sweeney, Trinity College; Michael Greenberg, Harvard Medical School; Eve Marder, Brandeis University; John H.R. Maunsell, The University of Chicago; Ikue Mori, Nagoya University; Christine Petit, Collège de France and the Institut Pasteur; Joshua Sanes, Harvard University (Chair).
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The Gruber International Prize Program honors individuals in the fields of Cosmology, Genetics and Neuroscience, whose groundbreaking work provides new models that inspire and enable fundamental shifts in knowledge and culture. The Selection Advisory Boards choose individuals whose contributions in their respective fields advance our knowledge and potentially have a profound impact on our lives.
The Gruber Foundation was established in 1993 by the late Peter Gruber and his wife Patricia Gruber. The Foundation began its International Prize Program in 2000, with the inaugural Cosmology Prize.
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For more information on the Gruber Prizes, visit www.gruber.yale.edu, e-mail info@gruber.yale.eduor contact A. Sarah Hreha at +1 (203) 432-6231. By mail: The Gruber Foundation, Yale University, Office of International Affairs, PO Box 208320, New Haven, CT 06520
Media materials and additional background information on the Gruber Prizes are in our online newsroom: www.gruber.yale.edu/news-media
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