Galvani's spark
Subtitle: the story of the nerve impulse
By: Alan J. McComas
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 391
ISBN-13: 9780199751754
Subjects: Instrumentation; History; Action potentials (Electrophysiology); Neural transmission; Neurophysiology; Action Potentials; Neural conduction; Research; Nervous System; History, 20th Century
Description: Galvani's chronicles the gradual understanding of the nerve impulse which is the basis of all thoughts, sensations and actions. The story begins with Luigi Galvani's chance observation of a spark from a friction machine causing a frog's leg to twitch from across the room. The accurate recording and the understanding of the properties of the nerve fiber membrane that makes the impulse possible became the objectives of neuroscientists for over 200 years. The author, Alan J. McComas finely interweaves the stories, the challenges, and the controversies of the most prominent figures in neuroscience, from the histological descriptions of nerve cells by Cajal to the discovery of a three-dimensional structure of ion channels in cell membranes by MacKinnon. Along the way he details the first recordings of the impulse with a cathode ray oscilloscope by Gasser and Erlanger, Adrian's discovery that stimulus intensity is coded by the frequency of nerve impulses, and Hodgkin and Huxley's brilliant voltage clamp experiments, amongst many others.The recognition by Galvani that muscles and nerves have an electrical component triggered the field of neurophysiology and in turn has produced some of the greatest discoveries in neuroscience.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: The spark; title: Catching up; title: The anatomist's eye; title: Cambridge, 1904 : the engineer; title: The cathode ray oscilloscope; title: The code; title: Excitation and inhibition; title: The messengers; title: The squid giant axon; title: The neuromuscular junction; title: The giant axon impaled; title: The war years; title: Sodium unmasked; title: The voltage clamp; title: Aftermath; title: Muscle : The new physiology; title: More triumphs with microelectrodes; title: The single ion channel; title: Myotonic goats and migraines; title: The swinging gate; title: Departures.