James Papez

Who was James Papez?

James Papez was an American neuroanatomist. Papez received his MD from the University of Minnesota College of Medicine and Surgery. He is most famous for his 1937 description of the Papez circuit which is a neural pathway in the brain thought to be involved in the cortical control of emotion. He was a neurologist at Cornell University when he published a journal article in which he outlined a "new" circuit to account for emotion. He hypothesized that the hippocampus, the cingulate gyrus, the hypothalamus, the anterior thalamic nuclei, and the interconnections among these structures constituted a harmonious mechanism which elaborate the functions of emotions. Papez never mentioned Broca's limbic lobe but others noted that his circuit was very similar to Broca's great limbic lobe.