New lecture series honors pioneer of sensory substitution

Patients often came to Paul Bach-y-Rita after hearing the words “nothing can be done.” Drawn to rehabilitation medicine after his father suffered a stroke, Bach-y-Rita created devices that harnessed the power of one sense to “substitute” for another. The results: blind patients steered themselves around obstacles; patients lacking stability gave up their canes.

After Bach-y-Rita’s death from lung cancer in November 2006, his colleagues set up a lectureship fund to support yearly presentations by distinguished neuroscientists. The series kicks off at 4 p.m. on Friday, April 3, in the Waisman Center’s John D. Wiley Conference Center. A reception follows.

Inaugural speaker Alvaro Pascual-Leone, of Boston’s Berenson-Allen Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, presents “Learning About Seeing From the Blind,” a discussion on sensory perception and brain organization among visually impaired individuals.

Since coming to UW–Madison in 1983 to lead the department of rehabilitation medicine, Bach-y-Rita’s work also encompassed neurobiology, biomedical engineering and orthopedics. His exploration of the brain’s “plasticity” and functional reorganization led him to found a spin-off company, Wicab, to market devices that turned tactile stimulation — typically on the patient’s tongue — into electrical signals to the brain. Near the end of his life, he even became his own patient, using Wicab’s BrainPort device to regain his balance.