Geoffrey Raisman

Raisman was a neuroscientist who in 1969 demonstrated that the adult brain forms new synaptic connections after injury, introducing the term 'synaptic plasticity' and overturning the belief that the mature nervous system is fixed. He later pioneered the use of olfactory ensheathing cells to repair severed nerve fibres, work applied to spinal-cord injury. He was born into a Jewish family in Leeds.