[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 10 (Wednesday, January 17, 2018)]
[House]
[Page H422]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    COMMEMORATING THE LIFE AND ACHIEVEMENTS OF PROFESSOR BEN BARRES

  (Mr. McNERNEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. McNERNEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise to commemorate the life and 
achievements of Ben Barres, a Stanford neurobiologist.
  Professor Barres started life as ``Barbara.'' He received a BS from 
MIT in 1976, an MD from Dartmouth in 1979, and a Ph.D. in neuroscience 
and neurobiology from Harvard in 1990. Ben started at Stanford in 1993 
and made the transition to male in 1997, always championing the cause 
of women in academia and dignity for everyone.
  Ben had 160 scientific publications. Perhaps his greatest 
achievements were about the glial cells in the brain that are 
responsible for the formation and regeneration of neurons. He found 
that the glial cells play a central role in developing the wiring of 
the brain. Prior to his work, these cells were thought of as the 
insulation for neurons, much like packing peanuts of the brain.
  Professor Barres cofounded Annexon Biosciences, Inc., a company that 
makes drugs to block neurodegeneration in Alzheimer's. Ben Barres died 
on December 27 of pancreatic cancer.

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