Deloro Prize 2023 to Prof. Jackie Schiller

The André Cohen Deloro Prize for 2023 was awarded to Professor Jackie Schiller of the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine on Monday, June 12 during the Technion’s Board of Governors meeting. The prize is bestowed annually in recognition of outstanding multidisciplinary research in the field of human health, on behalf of the Adelis Foundation, in memory of the late André Cohen Deloro. Prof. Schiller received the prize from Technion President Professor Uri Sivan and Trustee of the Adelis Foundation Mr. Sidney Boukhris.

The award is recognized by the André Cohen Deloro Institute for Transformative Biomedical Sciences and Engineering. The Adelis Foundation is currently supporting the construction of a new Technion center – the André Cohen Deloro Institute for Transformative Biomedical Sciences and Engineering. The new institute will serve as the epicenter of the Technion’s multidisciplinary research activities in human health and will feature state-of-the-art infrastructure necessary to drive innovation, including cutting-edge laboratories and equipment.

From left to right: Mr. Sidney Boukhris, Prof. Jackie Schiller and Technion President Prof. Uri Sivan

The André Cohen Deloro Institute will also serve as a hub of the newly established Technion Human Health Initiative. This large-scale initiative will further facilitate innovative research at the Technion by focusing on the next level of medical innovation through partnerships with Technion-affiliated hospitals and cutting-edge pharmaceutical and biomedical companies.

Prof. Schiller joined the Technion faculty following her post-doctoral fellowship with Nobel laureate Bert Sakmann at the Max Planck Institute in Germany. She is an experienced neurobiologist who researches the brain in the context of inter-disciplinary collaboration. Her research focuses on the way information is processed and stored in the cerebral cortex and is carried out in two parallel axes: she studies the computational abilities of the cortex and, at the same time, tries to understand the learning mechanisms and the cortex cells’ physical transformations. Prof. Schiller believes that “these cells have a remarkable ability to learn all the time, from the moment we are born and until we die, even though our brain cells die over the years.”

Technion President Prof. Uri Sivan

Technion President Prof. Uri Sivan said, “André Cohen Deloro passed away in 2012 but his legacy continues to flourish in the skillful, loving hands of Mrs. Rebecca Boukhris and Mr. Sidney Boukhris, both trustees of the Adelis Foundation. Prof. Schiller is a highly accomplished scientist whose work is a powerful combination of medicine and technology. Like the cells in the cerebral cortex, which don’t stop learning during their lifetime, so too Jackie never stops learning, researching, and leading her research group to dramatic and inspiring discoveries about the way we think and process information. She does all this while developing original and innovative technologies for studying the brain, which also contribute enormously to the world of research and medical applications. Prof. Schiller epitomizes the type of scientist of whom the Technion is so proud and so blessed to be home.”

Mr. Sidney Boukhris at the ceremony

Sidney Boukhris, Trustees of the Adelis Foundation, said, “it is with immense pride that the Adelis Foundation bestows the prestigious André Cohen Deloro Research Prize upon Prof. Jackie Schiller. Prof. Schiller is dedicated to unraveling the intricate structure of the cerebral cortex, the largest and most complex part of the brain. Undoubtedly, the field of neuroscience holds immense relevance in our modern era, as life expectancy continues to rise, and the pursuit of an enhanced quality of life becomes increasingly crucial. The impact of brain-related disorders on daily existence cannot be understated.”

Prof. Schiller explained that “studying the brain is a varied and multi-disciplinary research field that requires advanced engineering tools and profound theoretical work as well as pre-clinical and clinical trials. My research focuses on understanding the mechanisms of memory and learning on cellular and subcellular levels and on the level of the cortical network. We are studying the mechanisms in the cerebral cortex that enable the process of learning, representing and remembering new movements. We are especially interested in how different types of cells learn and carry out their roles.”

Prof. Jackie Schiller

Unlike most research on this subject, Prof. Schiller’s research group focuses on representing information about motion on the level of dendrites. “This is a level of resolution that has never been studied before. It provides deep insights into the mechanisms for learning and representing information. Since dendrites are the parts of the nerve cell that carry the data, we believe that the only way to achieve an in-depth understanding of the process is through this level of research. In this way, we were able to trace the most basic and deep information about how the brain creates movement commands.”

Prof. Schiller also studies what goes wrong in cerebral cortex cells in pathophysiological cases such as Parkinson’s disease. “Using advanced tools from the field of imaging, genetics, virology, behavior and computation, we study the cells at an unprecedented resolution. Beyond the scientific interest, there is substantial potential for developing treatments for a large variety of diseases.”

THE ADELIS FOUNDATION

The Adelis Foundation is an Israeli foundation that was created in 2006 by an exceptional man, André Cohen Deloro (z”l) (1933 – 2012). A graduate of the prestigious École Polytechnique and the École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, André Cohen Deloro (z”l) had a brilliant career in construction. Realizing his unbreakable link with the State of Israel, he built the Adelis Foundation – the most important work of his life. The Adelis Foundation was built so that André Cohen Deloro (z”l) could contribute in his own way to the wellbeing of the Jewish People and to the security of the State of Israel.

The Adelis Foundation was created based on the conviction that the security and future of Israel, its economic development, and its influence among the nations depended on the excellence of its universities and research centers. The Adelis Foundation believes that it is crucial to guarantee the knowledge of Israel’s next generations through the high level of education of its human capital in order to improve its future. But a strong nation is also a nation that knows how to take care of its weakest links.

Thus, the Adelis Foundation intervenes in the following key areas: scientific and medical research of excellence (65%), education – mainly in the social and geographical periphery (25%), and social well-being (10%).

In the field of science, the Adelis Foundation has a desire to help Israel through preserving its position among the world leaders in research and innovation through exploring new technological frontiers. The Adelis Foundation promotes these directives by financing research infrastructure in the country’s most promising academic institutions, as well as by granting research budgets to excellent researchers from the best universities in key areas where the State of Israel has added value. Research is likely to create scientific breakthroughs that improve the well-being of Israel’s citizens and of humanity as a whole, as our Jewish values ​​teach us.