Seymour S. Kety

Seymour S. Kety (August 25, 1915 – May 25, 2000) was an American neuroscientist who was credited with making modern psychiatry a rigorous and heuristic branch of medicine by applying basic science to the study of human behavior in health and disease. After Kety died, his colleague Louis Sokoloff noted that: "He discovered a method for measuring blood flow in the brain, was the first scientific director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and produced the most-definitive evidence for the essential involvement of genetic factors in schizophrenia."

Childhood

Seymour Kety was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and raised there. He was raised in humble family but was intellectually challenged and stimulated. Kety suffered from an automobile accident to his foot when he was a young child. He could still walk but was slightly physically impaired.

Schooling

He went to primary and secondary schools in Philadelphia. When Seymour reached high school, he excelled greatly in Chemistry. He ran experiments in his home in a homemade laboratory. Still living in Philadelphia, Kety attended the prestigious Central High School. He pursued his interest in the physical sciences and also got a knowledge of Greek and Latin. He attended college and medical school in his hometown at the University of Pennsylvania, from which he graduated in 1940. He did a rotating internship at the Philadelphia General Hospital but that was the extent of his clinical training. Kety went into research after his internship. He never trained in psychiatry although he changed its course. In 1988 Kety was awarded the NAS Award in the Neurosciences from the National Academy of Sciences.

External links

• Holzman, P.S. 2000. Seymour S. Kety 1915−2000. Nature Medicine 6:727
• Sokoloff, L. Seymour S. Kety. Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences