page_title: David Van Essen
section_title: Research career
hierarchical_section_title: David Van Essen / Research career
caption_attribution_description: English: A neuromuscular junction (or myoneural junction) is a chemical synapse formed by the contact between a motor neuron and a muscle fiber. It is at the neuromuscular junction that a motor neuron is able to transmit a signal to the muscle fiber, causing muscle contraction.
context_page_description: David C. Van Essen is an American neuroscientist specializing in neurobiology and studies the structure, function, development, connectivity and evolution of the cerebral cortex of humans and nonhuman relatives. After over two decades of teaching at the Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine, he currently serves as an Alumni Endowed Professor of Neuroscience and maintains an active laboratory. Van Essen has held numerous positions, including Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Neuroscience, Secretary of the Society for Neuroscience, and the President of the Society for Neuroscience from 2006 to 2007. Additionally, Van Essen has received numerous awards for his efforts in education and science, including the Krieg Cortical Discoverer Award from the Cajal Club in 2002, the Peter Raven Lifetime Achievement Award from St. Louis Academy of Science in 2007, and the Second Century Award in 2015 and the Distinguished Educator Award in 2017, both from Washington University School of Medicine.
context_section_description: Following his postdoctoral education, David Van Essen joined the faculty at The California Institute of Technology in 1976. Following his time at Caltech, Van Essen then moved to Washington University in St. Louis in 1992, where he served as the Head of the Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology for two decades. Van Essen stepped down from this position in 2012. His earlier research included studies of simpler systems, including synapse elimination at the neuromuscular junction. Van Essen has hypothesized that tension along axons and dendrites accounts for many aspects of morphogenesis, including how and why the cortex gets its folds and how cortical folding abnormalities arise in brain disorders.
caption: Neuromuscular Junction Diagram
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