Neuronists Vs Reticularists

Over the past couple of centuries our knowledge of the nervous system has increased rapidly. As there were developments in the technology and techniques that are used to study the nervous system. Previous to the discovery of the neuron there were many rival theories about the arrangement of the nervous system. The two leading scientific groups leading the research labelled themselves as ‘The Reticularists’ and ‘The Neuronists’. The Reticularists theory was that ‘the nervous system consisted of a large network of tissue, or reticulum, formed by the fused processes of nerve cells’. While the Neuronists believed that ‘the nervous system consisted of distinct elements, or cells’. However through the overtime development of their technology the
groups and other scientist gradually discovered more about the nervous system and how it works.
Achromatic lenses where added to the simple compound microscope in the 1820s and provided the clearest image of the nervous system yet. Compound microscopes have several different lenses, all with varying magnification levels. Their maximum magnification is approximately 2,000x the specimen’s size, allowing you to see cells, bacteria, algae and protozoa with it. Achromatic lenses include both concave and convex pieces. Allowing all colour wavelengths in light to be focussed to a single plane. The type of material used for each piece allows the colours to be dispersed differently; the convex piece is make from crown glass, while the concave piece is made from flint glass. In doing so they can produce the same meeting point, which can be seen in figure 1.The first scientist to use this newly developed microscope, to observe the nervous tissue was Johannes Evangelista Purkinje. He made many observation and discoveries while using it. He discovered the germinal vesicles, epidermis sweat gland and his namesake Purkinjie fibres, which can be found in the heart. However Purkinjie is most famous for discovering the cerebellar cell. Which was only first identified because it was one of the largest cell in the vertebrate brain. In 1943 the microscope was once again improved with the invention of the electron microscope. Electron microscopes allowed scientist to see great amounts of detail as you would be able to see samples as small as the molecular. This refined the neuron doctrine and paved way for new scientific research. Research were able to understand that the nerve cell use electrical synapses, not only chemical ones. The electron microscope is still used today.
In the mid nineteenth century the main proponent of reticular theory; Gerlach, introduced a new method in which would allow scientists to see the nervous tissue clearer than ever before.
This technique was called staining, and was when one would stain nervous tissue before examining to under a microscope. However, several years later in 1873, Camillo Golgi came out with a new, improved staining method. The staining technique, allows the frequently transparent microbial cytoplasm’s to be seen with the light of the microscope by staining them. Through this new method there were several new discoveries, surrounding the nervous system. Golgi however, even with this new method still held on to the belief that the nervous system consist of a continuous network. Though he was wrong about this theory, he still made a lot of important discoveries while he was using the staining method including the identification of projection neurons, interneurons, and tendon organs and discovered what is called now the ‘Golgi complex’. In 1887 Santiago Ramón y Cajal, a Spanish scientist, pioneered yet another improved method in the staining technique which allowed the image obtained to be even clearer. With is artistic skill he was able to make extremely accurate diagrams of the nervous tissue, however due to language barriers his, Spanish written, work was not well known. His finding counteracted Golgi’s as Cajal reported that there no found evidence in his research to support the theory that the nervous system consists of a continuous network. Instead he stated that the neuron was the anatomical and function of the nervous
system.
In the future there will definitely be more discoveries in the future, directly related to the new developments in technology and scientific methods. As the world’s technology enhances so will our knowledge of the nervous system. Even with updated microscopes scientist are still not able to completely study the brain to its full extent and will not be able to fully unlock its scientific secrets with our current resources.