Eric Richard Kandel ( born 7 November 1929 in Vienna , Austria ) is a Jewish American neuropsychiatrist . Kandel won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2000 for describing the physiological basis of memory storage in neurons . Eric Richard Kandel ( born November 7 , 1929 ) is an American neuropsychiatrist who was a recipient of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his research on the physiological basis of memory storage in neurons .