Don L Jewett: Difference between revisions
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| birth_date = {{birth date|1931|1|28|mf=y}} | | birth_date = {{birth date|1931|1|28|mf=y}} | ||
| birth_place = Eureka, California, United States | | birth_place = Eureka, California, United States | ||
| death_date = {{death date|2026|4|17| | | death_date = {{death date and age|2026|4|17|1931|1|28}} | ||
| fields = [[Neuroscientist]] | | fields = [[Neuroscientist]] | ||
| workplaces = [[University of California, San Francisco]] | | workplaces = [[University of California, San Francisco]] | ||
Latest revision as of 16:15, 20 July 2026
Don L. Jewett | |
|---|---|
| Born | January 28, 1931 Eureka, California, United States |
| Died | April 17, 2026 (aged 95) |
| Residence | Mill Valley, CA, United States |
| Nationality | USA |
| Alma mater | University of California, San Francisco; University of Oxford |
| Known for | auditory evoked potentials ("Jewett waves"), plate tectonics, exploding planets, expanding earth, neutrino absorption, gravity aberration |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Neuroscientist |
| Institutions | University of California, San Francisco |
Don Lee Jewett (January 28, 1931 – April 17, 2026) was an American neuroscientist and physiologist who served as professor emeritus of orthopaedic surgery at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He is best known for the first description of the human brainstem auditory evoked potentials, a series of short-latency far-field waves recorded from the scalp that are commonly referred to as "Jewett waves" in recognition of his pioneering work. In later years he also published on topics in the natural sciences outside neurophysiology, including an "exploding planets" mechanism for panspermia.
Biography
Jewett was born on January 28, 1931, in Eureka, California. He earned his medical degree (M.D.) from the University of California, San Francisco in 1960, followed by a D.Phil. from the University of Oxford in 1963 and postdoctoral training at Yale University in 1964. He joined the UCSF faculty in 1965, holding appointments in physiology and orthopaedic surgery, and remained a full-time faculty member until 1991, when he became professor emeritus. From 1991 he also served as research director at Abratech Corporation, continuing work on signal-processing methods for evoked responses.
Jewett resided in Mill Valley, California. He died on April 17, 2026, at the age of 95.
Work
In 1970 Jewett and colleagues reported that averaging electrical activity recorded from the human scalp revealed a set of small, very-short-latency vertex-positive waves evoked by sound. They proposed that these deflections, occurring within a few milliseconds of an auditory stimulus, were generated by structures in the brainstem. This finding established the brainstem auditory evoked potential (also known as the auditory brainstem response, ABR, or brainstem auditory evoked response, BAER), a technique that became widely used to assess the function of the auditory nerve and brainstem auditory pathways. The individual peaks of the response are conventionally labeled with Roman numerals and are frequently called "Jewett waves."
Over his career Jewett published on a range of topics in neurophysiology and biophysics, including nerve repair and regeneration, mechanisms of nerve-fiber block, dipole-source analysis and localization of volume-conducted potentials, three-channel Lissajous trajectory analysis of the auditory brainstem response, deconvolution methods for recovering overlapping transient evoked responses, bone potentials associated with orthodontic movement, and the effects of indoor lighting on the development of myopia.
Outside of neurophysiology, Jewett authored a 2007 paper, "The conceptual benefits of 'exploding planets' as a mechanism for panspermia," published in the International Journal of Astrobiology. In it he examined the hypothesis that the breakup of former planets and moons in the Solar System could serve as a vehicle for the transfer of biological material between bodies, relating the idea to broader questions in planetary science such as plate tectonics and the expanding earth concept.
Honors
The eponymous term "Jewett waves," used internationally to describe the components of the brainstem auditory evoked potential, reflects the recognition of his foundational contribution to the field.