Michael S. Gazzaniga (born December 12, 1939) is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he heads the new SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind. He is one of the leading researchers in cognitive neuroscience, the study of the neural basis of mind. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Academy of Sciences.
In 1961, Gazzaniga graduated from Dartmouth College. In 1964, he received a Ph.D. in psychobiology from the California Institute of Technology, where he worked under the guidance of Roger Sperry, with primary responsibility for initiating human split-brain research. In his subsequent work he has made important advances in our understanding of functional lateralization in the brain and how the cerebral hemispheres communicate with one another.
Gazzaniga's publication career includes books for a general audience such as The Social Brain, Mind Matters, Nature's Mind, The Ethical Brain and Who's in Charge?. He is also the editor of the The Cognitive Neurosciences book series published by the MIT Press, which features the work of nearly 200 scientists and is a sourcebook for the field. His latest monograph is entitled Who's in Charge?: Free Will and the Science of the Brain. It was published by HarperCollins in 2011.
Gazzaniga is a comune (municipality) in the Province of Bergamo in the Italian region of Lombardy, located about 60 kilometres (37 mi) northeast of Milan and about 15 kilometres (9 mi) northeast of Bergamo.
Gazzaniga borders the following municipalities: Albino, Aviatico, Cene, Cornalba, Costa di Serina, Fiorano al Serio, Vertova.
Traces of human presence in the Bronze Age have been found in Gazzaniga. The first document attesting the existence of a burgh (castle) dates from 476 AD, when the Barbarian king Odoacer ransacked it. In the Middle Ages Gazzaniga was part of the Confederazione de Honio together with neighbouring communes; in 1397 Gazzaniga was destroyed by the Ghibellines, and again by the Guelphs in the next year.
Later Gazzaniga was in the possession of the Republic of Venice. In 1629 Gazzaniga suffered from a plague.
Gazzaniga may refer to: