Manuel Casanova

Education and early career

Casanova earned his medical degree from the University of Puerto Rico. He then completed clinical and research fellowships at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, including three years in neuropathology, where he was in-charge of pediatric neuropathology, which was when his interest in developmental disorders of the brain arose. He subsequently helped establish two brain banks, the Johns Hopkins Brain Resource Center and the Brain Bank Unit of the Clinical Brains Disorders Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).

Casanova spent several years as a deputy medical examiner for Washington, D.C., where he gained experience with the postmortem examination of sudden infant death syndrome and child abuse, which was when he began publishing extensively on postmortem techniques, including neuronal morphometry immunocytochemistry, neurochemistry, and autoradiography. He also worked as a consultant and was staff neuropathologist at Sinai Hospital in Maryland, the North Charles Hospital, and the D.C. General Hospital. He is also a former lieutenant commander in the US Public Health Service. After serving as a professor of psychiatry and neurology at the Medical College of Georgia, he subsequently joined the University of Louisville faculty.

Research

Casanova's recent research projects have examined brain abnormalities in patients with language disturbances, including autism, dyslexia and Asperger syndrome. His interest has gradually come to focus on abnormalities of cortical neurocircuitry, in particular on the cell minicolumn, a vertical conglomerate of eighty to one hundred neurons that have in common a latency of response to stimulation. Using computerized imaging analysis, he has established the anatomical validity of the cell minicolumn. Casanova has reported interhemispheric differences in the morphometry of minicolumns that could provide explanations for the speciation of hominids. Localized in Brodmann area 22—part of Wernicke’s language region—the morphometric difference may play a role both in the development of language and in related disorders.

His neuromorphology research, conducted in collaboration with other researchers from around the globe, has found there are drastic differences in the brains of autistic individuals. The studies that he conducted show that minicolumns (or 'brain strands') of autism spectrum individuals have more cells, but they are narrower and more densely packed, which he says can limit the brain's ability to send messages. Casanova claimed this helps explain symptoms since "there's not enough juice to actually power very long connections in the brain".

Recognition

His expertise in the field of postmortem techniques was recognized by honorary appointments as a Scientific Expert for the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology and as a Professorial Lecturer for the Department of Forensic Science at George Washington University.

Awards

Since arriving in 2015, Dr. Casanova has continued his outstanding scholarly productivity, bringing marked recognition to both the medical school and GHS. In addition to dozens of publications and presentations over the past year, Dr. Casanova is recognized internationally for his record of ongoing scholarship on autism. For example, Dr. Casanova was elected as the inaugural president of the International Consortium of Autism Institutes (ICAI) in a ceremony in Russia. Dr. Casanova recently returned from China where he was a keynote speaker at the inauguration of the Center for National Autism Rehabilitation, which will be the largest autism center in China. He was also named to the Scientific Advisory Board of the Autism Research Institute (ARI) and led several national consensus panels sponsored by the institute. Manny has worked tirelessly to establish a network of collaborators and stakeholders since being named as the Centers of Economic Excellence Endowed Chair in Pediatric Neurotherapeutics.

Scientists Mikhail Lebedev, Ioan Opris and Manuel Casanova have now published a comprehensive collection of research into brain augmentation, and their efforts have won a major European science research prize—the Frontiers Spotlight Award. This $100,000 prize is for the winners to set up a conference that highlights emerging research in their field.

View on Neurodiversity

Dr. Casanova has claimed that some members of the Neurodiversity movement compare his research to genocide. He has received disparaging phone calls and emails, and even death threats. Additionally, he communicates online about neurodiversity and shares research with Jonathan Mitchell, an autistic author and blogger. Casanova also points out that parents that support therapy or treatment for autistic children say that it will reduce their suffering and give them the best chance to succeed in adulthood, because they claim that it is not possible for society to accommodate autistics. In a journal article, Casanova criticized neurodiversity advocates for ignoring the roles of Leo Kanner and Bernard Rimland in advocating for accommodations, claiming that this is because those individuals also wanted medical treatments for autism. He also claimed that Neurotribes, a book written from the neurodiversity perspective, was unfairly weighted against Leo Kanner.

Books

Publications