Wallace Mendelson MD was Professor of Psychiatry and Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Chicago and has been engaged in sleep research and clinical care for 40 years. He has been the director of the sleep laboratory at the National Institute of Mental Health intramural program, the Sleep Disorder Center at the Cleveland Clinic, and the Sleep Research Laboratory at the University of Chicago. Mendelson has authored or co-authored three books on sleep research and sleep disorders medicine and published almost 200 papers in academic journals. He is a past president of the Sleep Research Society and the recipient of various honors including a special award for excellence in sleep and psychiatry from the National Sleep Foundation in 2010.