The Open University of Israel

Prof. Simona Ginsburg

Department of Natural Sciences

Updated: June 2010


 

Personal

Tel (Office): 972-2-677-3330

E-mail: simona@openu.ac.il

Date of birth: 19.9.1947

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Education

1969

 B.Sc., Chemistry (summa cum laude), Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel
1974 D.Phil., Physiology, Oxford University, UK
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Academic and Professional Experience

1970-1973 Tutor in Chemistry and Physiology, Somerville College, Oxford, UK
1973-1974 Research Assistant, Physiology Department, Oxford University, UK
1973-1974 Lecturer in Physiology, Balliol College, Oxford, UK
1975-1976 Research Fellow, Science Teaching Department, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel
1975-1990 Senior Lecturer, The Open University of Israel, Tel-Aviv, Israel
1978-1979 Senior Investigator, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New-York, USA
1982-1984 Fellow, The Van-Leer Institute, Jerusalem, Israel
1986-1987 Fellow, University College, London, UK
1990-present Associate-Professor, The Open University of Israel, Tel-Aviv, Israel
2004 (June-Sept.) Senior Guest Investigator, Charles Darwin Foundation, Puerto Ayora, Galapagos
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Research Grants

1984-1985 Friends of the Hebrew University, USA, Meller Fund Grant (with H. Meiri)
1984-1987 Israel Academy of Sciences, Israel: Basic Research Fund Grant (with R. Rahamimoff)
1989-1991 German Israel Foundation (GIF) Grant (with R. Rahamimoff)
1991-1994 Muscular Dystrophy Association Grant (with R. Rahamimoff)
1993-1995 Smokeless Tobacco Research Council Grant (with R. Rahamimoff)
1993-1995 Israel Science Foundation Grant (with R. Rahamimoff)
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Membership in Professional Societies & Editorial Activities

1983-present Israel Physiological and Pharmacological Society
1983-1989 Editorial Board, Mada Journal (Hebrew), Israel
1986-present Society of Neurosciences, USA
1987-present International Brain Research Organization (IBRO)
1989-present The American Biophysical Society
1993-present Israel Society for Neuroscience
1998-present International Association for Bioethics
2000-present Israel Society for the History and Philosophy of Science
2003-present The International Society for History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB)
2003-present Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness
2004-present Consciousness and Experiential Psychology (CEP), Section of the British Psychological Society
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Active Participation in Scientific Meetings

December 1982 Physiological Society Meeting, London, UK
March 1983 Israel Society for Physiology And Pharmacology Meeting, Rehovot, Israel
August 1984 International Union of Physiological Society Symposium, Jerusalem, Israel
September 1984 New Perspectives in Education, The Van-Leer and Aspen Institute Conference, Berlin, Germany
1986 Israel Society for Physiology and Pharmacology Meeting, Jerusalem, Israel
1987 Israel Society for Physiology and Pharmacology Meeting, Tel-Aviv, Israel
Summer 1988 Workshop in Neurobiology, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel
February 1989 Membrane Biophysics Subgroup at the 33rd Biophysical Society Meeting, Cincinnati, OH
February 1990 34th Biophysical Society Meeting, Baltimore, MD
February 1991 35th Biophysical Society Meeting, San Francisco, CA
February 1992 Joint Meeting of the Biophysical Society and American Society for Biochemistry, Houston, TX
August 1993 International Union for Physiological Sciences Meeting, Glasgow, UK
December 1993 Joint Meeting of Italian and Israeli Societies for Neurosciences, Eilat, Israel
November 1994 FAOPS Congress, Shanghai, China
February 1995 39th Biophysical Society Meeting, San Francisco, CA
December 1996 Israel Society for Neuroscience Meeting, Eilat, Israel
November 1998 Fourth World Congress on Bioethics, Tokyo, Japan
May 1999 World Congress on Biomedical Communications, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
May 2000 IV Meeting on Glial Cell Function, Barcelona, Spain
September 2000 Fifth World Congress on Bioethics, London, UK
July 2003 International Society for History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB) Conference, Vienna, Austria
May 2005 International Conference on Science, Law and Ethics, Haifa, Israel
April 2006 Toward a Science of Consciousness, Tucson, AZ
July 2007 International Society for History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB) Conference, Exeter, UK
December 2007 International Workshop on Phenotypic and Developmental Plasticity Workshop, Trivandrum, India
May 2008 Invited lecture for The Bar-Hillel Colloquium: Studies in History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science
June 2009 Transformations of Lamarckism: 200 years to the Philosophie Zoologique, The Twenty-Third Annual International Workshop on the History and Philosophy of Science
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List of Publications

Articles in Refereed Journals

  1. D. Wynne, S. Ginsburg and Y. Shalitin (1973). Beef liver esterase. II. Kinetic properties. Arch. Biochem. Biophys. 154, 204-211.
  2. S. Ginsburg and D. Noble (1974). The activation enthalpies for ion conductance systems in lipid bilayer membranes. J. Membr. Biol. 18, 163-176.
  3. S. Ginsburgand D. Noble (1976). Use of current-voltage diagrams in locating peak energy barriers in cell membranes. J. Membr. Biol. 29, 211-229.
  4. S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1983). Is extracellular calcium buffering involved in regulation of transmitter release at the neuromuscular junction? Nature 306, 62-64.
  5. S.D. Silberberg, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1986). Neuromuscular depression. Rev. Clin. Basic Pharmacol. 6, 15s-21s.
  6. R. Shapira, S.D. Silberberg, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1987). Activation of protein kinase C augments evoked transmitter release. Nature 325, 58-60.
  7. Y. Shimoni and S. Ginsburg (1987). Negative inotropic effect of extracellular calcium buffering in cardiac muscle. Am. J. Physiol. 252, C248-C252.
  8. R. Rahamimoff, S.A. DeRiemer, S. Ginsburg, I. Kaiserman, B. Sakmann, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1989). Ionic channels in presynaptic vesicles: Are they involved in transmitter release? Quart. J. Exp. Physiol. 74, 1019-1031.
  9. S. Ginsburg and Y. Shimoni (1989). Modulation of effect of extracellular calcium buffering in cardiac muscle. Am. J. Physiol. 257, H1843-H1850.
  10. R. Rahamimoff, S.A. DeRiemer, S. Ginsburg, I. Kaiserman, B. Sakmann, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1990). Ionic channels and proteins in synaptic vesicles: Facts and speculations. J. Basic Physiol. Pharmacol. 1, 7-17.
  11. J. Edry-Schiller, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1991). A bursting potassium channel in isolated cholinergic synaptosomes of Torpedo electric organ. J. Physiol. (London) 439, 627-647.
  12. R. Rahamimoff, J. Edry-Schiller and S. Ginsburg (1992). A long closed state of the synaptosomal bursting potassium channel confers a statistical memory. J. Neurophysiol. 68, 2260-2263.
  13. R. Cherki-Vakil, S. Ginsburg and H. Meiri (1995). The difference in shape of spontaneous and uniquantal evoked potentials in frog muscle. J. Physiol. (London) 482, 641-650.
  14. R. Rahamimoff, J. Edry-Schiller, M. Rubin-Fraenkel, A. Butkevich and S. Ginsburg (1995). Oscillations in the activity of a potassium channel at the presynaptic nerve terminal. J. Neurophysiol. 73, 2448-2458.
  15. A. Meir, S. Ginsburg, A. Butkevich, S. G. Kachalsky, I. Kaiserman, R. Ahdut, S. Demirgoren and R. Rahamimoff (1999). Ion channels in presynaptic nerve terminals and control of transmitter release. Physiol. Rev. 79, 1019-1088.
  16. S. Ginsburg and E. Jablonka (2007). The transition to experiencing: I. Limited learning and limited experiencing. Biological Theory 2, 218-230.
  17. S. Ginsburg and E. Jablonka (2007). The transition to experiencing: II. The evolution of associative learning based on feelings. Biological Theory 2, 231-243.
  18. S. Ginsburg and E. Jablonka (2009). Epigenetic learning in non-neural organisms. Journal of Biosciences 34(4), 633-646.
  19. S. Ginsburg and E. Jablonka (accepted 2009). Experiencing: A Jamesian Approach. Journal of Consciousness Studies.
  20. Ginsburg, S. and Jablonka, E. (forthcoming). The evolution of associative learning: a factor in the Cambrian explosion. Journal of Theoretical Biology.
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Chapters in Refereed Books

  1. S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1986). Serendiptic modulation of transmitter release: extracellular inhomogeneity. In Calcium, Neuronal Function and Transmitter Release (R. Rahamimoff and B. Katz, Eds.), Martinus Nijhoff, Boston, pp. 181-197.
  2. R. Fink, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1986). Bipahasic effect of calcium on tetanic potentiation at the frog neuromuscular junction. In Calcium, Neuronal Function and Transmitter Release (R. Rahamimoff and B. Katz, Eds.), Martinus Nijhoff, Boston, pp. 601-612.
  3. R. Rahamimoff, S.D. Silberberg, I. Nussinovitch and S. Ginsburg (1986). In Sensorimotor Plasticity: Theoretical, Experimental and Clinical Aspects (S. Ron, R. Schmid and M. Jeannerod, Eds.), Les Edition Inserm, Paris, pp. 17-44.
  4. R. Rahamimoff, S.D. Silberberg and S. Ginsburg (1987). In Current Advances in Skeleto-genesis, Vol. 3 (S. Horovitz and J. Sela, Eds.), Heiliger Publishing, Jerusalem, pp. 3-12.
  5. R. Rahamimoff, M. Abdul-Ghani, S.A. DeRiemer, S. Ginsburg, B. Sakmann, R. Shapira, S.D. Silberberg, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1988). Regulation of acetylcholine release: calcium, peptide channels and vesicle. In Neuromuscular Junction (L.C. Sellin, R. Libelius and S. Thesleff, Eds.), Elsevier Science Publishers, Amsterdam, pp. 125-136.
  6. R. Rahamimoff, M. Abdul-Ghani, S. DeRiemer, J. Schiller, S. Ginsburg, N. Melamed, B. Sakmann, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1990). Channels of the cholinergic nerve terminal. Symposium on The Cholinergic Synapse, Berlin, 1990.
  7. R. Rahamimoff, S. DeRiemer, J. Edry-Schiller, S. Ginsburg, I. Kaiserman, R. Martin, B. Sakmann, H. Stadler and N, Yakir (1990). Ionic channels in isolated and fused presynaptic nerve endings. Second Congress of the Asian and Oceanic Physiological Societies, New Delhi, India, 1990.
  8. R. Rahamimoff, M. Abdul-Ghani, S. Ginsburg, E.A. Kravitz, H. Meiri, R. Shapira and S.D. Silberberg (1990). Regulation of synaptic transmission. Second Congress of the Asian and Oceanic Societies, New Delhi, India, 1990.
  9. R Rahamimoff, S. Ginsburg, M. Abdul-Ghani, R. Shapira, N. Yakir and S. Einav (1991). Principles of transmitter release. In Presynaptic Regulation of Neurotransmitter Release (J. Feigenbaum and M. Hanani, Eds.), Freund Publishing House, London, pp. 1-38.
  10. R Rahamimoff, S. Ginsburg, G. Barkai, B. Cook, J. Edry-Schiller, I. Kaiserman, A. Meir, M. Roll, M.K. Worden and N. Yakir (1994). Ion channels in biological membranes. Ch. 3 in Biomembranes (M. Shinitzki, Ed.), Balaban Publishers, New York, pp. 196-296.
  11. Ginsburg, S. (forthcoming). Lamarck on the nervous system: past insights leading to future perspectives. In: Transformations of Lamarckism: 200 years to the Philosophie Zoologique (S. Gissis and E. Jablonka, Eds.), The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
  12. Tavory, I., Ginsburg, S. and Jablonka, E. (forthcoming). Culture and epigenesis: a Waddingtonian view. In: The Oxford Handbook of Culture and Psychology (J. Valsiner, Ed.), Oxford Universitry Press, New-York.
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Book Review

E. Jablonka and S. Ginsburg (2006). Review of Derek Denton's The Primordial Emotions: The Dawning of Consciousness (Oxford University Press, 2006). J. Consc. Stud. 15, 105-109.

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Abstracts (since 1990)

  1. R. Rahamimoff, S. DeRiemer, S. Ginsburg, I. Keiserman, B. Sakmann, J. Schiller, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1990). Channels in subcellular organelles of the presynaptic nerve terminals: relation to transmitter release. 1989 IBRO Meeting, Jerusalem.
  2. R. Rahamimoff, S. DeRiemer, J. Edry-Sciller, S. Ginsburg, B. Sakmann, H. Stadler and N. Yakir (1990). Ionic channels in the cholinergic nerve terminals of Torpedo electric organ. Symposium “The Cholinergic Synapse,” Berlin.
  3. J. Edry-Schiller, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1991). A chloride channel in isolated fused synaptosomes from Torpedo electric organ. J. Physiol. (London) 438, 231P.
  4. S. Ginsburg, J. Edry-Schiller and R.Rahamimoff (1992). A basic kinetic scheme for a chloride channel in synaptosomes from Torpedo electric organ. Biophys. J. 61, A511.
  5. S. Ginsburg, J. Edry-Schiller and R. Rahamimoff (1993). Chloride channels in fused synaptosomes. Joint Meetings of Nazionale Delle Richeche Ilalia and Israel Society for Neuroscience, Eilat, 1993.
  6. J. Edry-Schiller, M. Rubin-Fraenkel, S. Ginsburg and R. Rahamimoff (1993). Oscillations in the activity of potassium channels from fused Torpedo synaptosomes. J. Physiol. (London) 473, 178P.
  7. S. Ginsburg, N.Yakir, A. Meir and R. Rahamimoff (1994). Ion channels in presynaptic nerve terminals. Third FAOPS Congress, Shanghai, 1994.
  8. R. Rahamimoff, N. Melamed-Book, M. Rubin-Fraenkel, A Butkevich, J. Edry-Schiller and S. Ginsburg (1995). Cellular oscillatory processes in the nervous system. Isr. J. Med. Sci. 31, 778.
  9. S. Ginsburg (2003). Words that alter brains: a shift in neurocognitive research? (Presented at the ISHPSSB Conference, Vienna, July).
  10. S. Ginsburg and E. Jablonka (2006). Associative learning as the functional context for the evolution of basic consciousness. Presented at the conference Toward a Science of Consciousness, Tucson, AZ, April.
  11. E. Jablonka and S. Ginsburg (2007). Memorizing plasticity: On epigenetic and neural learning. Phenotypic and Developmental Plasticity Workshop, Trivandrum, India.
  12. S. Ginsburg (2009). Lamarck on the nervous system: Past insights leading to future perspectives. Transformations of Lamarckism: 200 years to the Philosophie Zoologique, The Twenty-Third Annual International Workshop on the History and Philosophy of Science, Jerusalem, June.
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Open University Books

Introduction to Life Sciences (3 units)
Philosophy of Science (12 units, with G. Freudenthal)
Symmetry (3 units in biology and 4 units in chemistry, co-authored with D. Ginsburg)
Nerve Cells - Introduction to Neurobiology (10 units)
The Vertebrates (1 unit)
Ionic Channels (1 unit)
Human Physiology (Study Guide for 4 units)
Introduction to “The Mind-Body Problem” (M.A. program in Biological Thought)
Introduction to “A Critical View of Alternative Medicine” (M.A. program in Biological Thought)
Introduction to “Animal Experimentation” (M.A. program in Biological Thought)
Introduction to “Ecological Balance” (M.A. program in Biological Thought)
Guide: How to write an essay in Biological Thought (M.A. program in Biological Thought)
Guide: How to Write an Essay in Life Sciences
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Current Research

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Teaching Activities (since 1990)

Teaching at the Hebrew University
Graduate Seminar in Neurobiology (with R. Rahamimoff, H. Meiri and Y. Yaari): 1991, 1993, 1995, 1997
Course on Kinetics and Stochastic Properties of Ion Channels (with R. Rahamimoff and M. Lineal): 1991, 1993, 1995
Teaching at the Open University
Tutor, Symmetry: 1991, 1994, 1997
Tutor, Ionic Channels: 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001
Head of Program and Tutor of 10 courses in the M.A. program in Biological Thought (2001-present)
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Other Academic Activities at the Open University (since 1990)

Course development and consulting: Consultant for numerous Life Science courses and several courses in Social Studies and Humanities
Academic Committees: Chairperson of the Physical and Life Sciences Subcommittee, 1994-1997
Teaching Guidance: Written Guide for Life Sciences Students
Head of the Research Authority (1998-2001): Author of guidelines for the establishment of the OU Research Authority, 1997
Special Programs
1. Proposal for a Study Program for Outstanding Students (1993, with G. Kulka)
2. Design of the MA program in Biological Thought (1997)
Biological Thought on the Internet: Building and supervision of the home page of the entire program and of 10 separate courses, and active participation in online discussion groups [the page (in Hebrew) is open to the public, here]
Other Committees (at present): Member of the OU Council, Strategic Forum, MA Teaching Committee, Academic Promotion Committee for Lecturers
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