Robert Bárány made significant contributions to our 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 on April 22, 1876, 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 Bá...