Robert Bárány made significant contributions to the understanding of the vestibular apparatus, part of the inner ear that plays an important role in maintaining balance. He devised ingenious tests to diagnose inner-ear disease, and he investigated the relationship between the vestibular and nervous systems. Because of his ground-breaking research in this area, he is credited with creating a new field of study, otoneurology. Bárány's achievements were recognized in 1914 with the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine.

Bárány was born in Rohonc (near Vienna), Austria-Hungary (now Austria), the eldest of six children. His father, Ignaz Bárány, was a bank official. His mother, Marie Hock Bárány, was the daughter of a well-known Prague scientist, and it was her intellectual influence that predominated in the family. When Bárá...