Ramón Y Cajal Explained How The Brain Works With These Drawings
Santiago Ramón y Cajal is one of the most important Spanish figures and recognized in the field of neurosciences.
Nobel Prize winner along with Golgi, this scientist contributed greatly to the understanding of the functioning of the nervous system and the network of neurons that makes up the brain. In addition to that, made detailed illustrations of the brain and neurons, with which to show the functioning of the brain. In this article we briefly review his illustrations and his contributions to neuroscience.
Santiago Ramón y Cajal was born in 1852 in the Navarrese town of Petilla de Aragón. Son of Antonia Cajal and Justo Ramón, he spent his childhood constantly changing residences as his father was his doctor and surgeon. Since he was a child he had great artistic abilities, dreaming of dedicating himself to painting, although his father would end up convincing him to study medicine. He graduated from the University of Zaragoza in 1873, and would later be sent to the Cuban War where he would work as a doctor.
After returning, he would obtain a doctorate in Madrid. Later he would marry Silveria Fañanás García and have seven children. It would be in 1887 when he would move to Barcelona, where he would make some of his main discoveries, being the first to isolate and study the neuron as a key element of the nervous system, or the connections between these cells.
In 1892 he returned to Madrid, where he would live until his death. In 1906 he received, together with the Italian Camillo Golgi, the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. He retired in 1926, and his wife died of tuberculosis four years later. He died on October 17, 1934 due to coronary problems linked to intestinal problems.
Ramón y Cajal and his images: methods used
During the years he spent researching, Ramón y Cajal discovered a large amount of information regarding the functioning and structure of the nervous system. As?
When making his observations, this researcher used the staining method created by Camile Golgi, which using silver chromate allowed the observation of part of the brain tissue. Ramón y Cajal introduced several improvements in order to obtain a clearer image, in addition to thinking about investigating young cells in order to be able to distinguish whether the brain is a continuous element or is made up of simpler structures.
However, when it came to reflecting his discoveries he encountered many difficulties. At that time, current image-taking techniques did not exist, making it very difficult for a scientist to be able to show the world a faithful reflection of what was happening at a microscopic level beyond mere description. This researcher would use illustration for this.
And Santiago Ramón y Cajal had not abandoned the artistic side that he had already expressed in childhood. The researcher would feel real pleasure in pictorially representing his discoveries, in addition to allowing him to clearly show others the results of his observations. Thanks to them we can observe how the researcher clearly established aspects such as the morphology of neurons and multiple components, his drawings being a work of great scientific use that allowed us to know the shape and imagine the functioning of the basic units of the nervous system, the neurons.
For him, a good drawing meant the creation of scientific documentation of great value, regardless of the interpretation given to it. The images created by Ramón y Cajal represent a faithful representation of the nervous system and its organization, surprising for their level of fidelity and accuracy, examples of this being the illustration of pyramidal neurons, astrocytes or microglia.
Discovering the world of neurons
Here you can see a selection of the drawings that Santiago Ramón y Cajal himself created to capture his findings.
Some of his discoveries
The role of Santiago Ramón y Cajal in the field of neurosciences is of fundamental importance. Not in vain was he awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. The reason for such importance is due to the great discoveries he made, some of which we present below.
First of all, we owe Ramón y Cajal the knowledge that The basic unit of the nervous system is the neuron Before him, the existence of the neuronal theory was proposed (according to which neurons are the basic element of the neural network, based on the existence of basic elements that, although they communicated, were not available continuously) and the reticular theory (which proposes that the nervous system is a continuous network) hypothesis that the nervous system was a single set of interconnected networks that functioned in unison.
Thanks to the modifications in Golgi staining, the Spanish researcher would realize that although the nervous system acts as a system, it is composed of separate and independent cells that, although they have a certain connection, do not touch each other because there is a synaptic space between them. they. Thus, Ramón y Cajal would demonstrate the neuronal theory, giving rise to the neuron doctrine, which is still valid today.
His theories also reflected the way in which the nerve impulse is transmitted through the system For example, his research generated an explanation for why nerve impulses travel only in one direction, the so-called law of dynamic polarization.
Finally, another of his discoveries has to do with the discovery and analysis of parts of neurons, like dendritic spines, which were previously considered a product of the functioning of the nervous system. We now know, thanks to him, that these spines are an important part of each neuron and that they actively participate in the transmission of information.
