Would you please so kind as to post the following on CVNet?
Thanks.
Steven Lehar
slehar@cns-alumni.bu.edu
I am interested in standing wave phenomena in neural tissue, and its
possible functional significance in the brain. If you know of any
physiological or theoretical work in this area, I would be very
interested in hearing from you.
Wolfgang Koehler [1] mentions work by "Bremer" who found standing
waves in the spinal chord of the cat, and "Gerard & Libet" who found
standing waves in the frog. Unfortunately his comments appear in Mary
Henle's book [2] without the original reference list. Can anyone give
me the correct reference to Bremer's or Gerard & Libet's work, or a
reference to similar findings by other researchers? Or does anyone
have access to Koehler's original publication [3] which presumably
contains the correct references?
Thanks for your help,
Steven Lehar
slehar@cns-alumni.bu.edu
[1] Koehler quoted from [2] p. 256, originally published in [3].
"...Bremer's excellent experiments. Under the influence of strychnine,
the motor neurons in the spinal chord of the curarized cat get into a
state of rythmic excitation. The frequency of the waves varies from
about ten to thirty per second. What is remarkable, however, is that,
from one end of the spinal chord to the other, the electrical waves
are exactly in phase, i.e. synchronized. This can naturally be
explained only by a mutual influence of the greatest speed, a speed
never achieved by the propagation of excitation in fibers and through
synapses. Bremer himself speaks, therefore, of an electrical
interaction of the active cells. That this is really what happens he
then demonstrated convincingly in a separate experiment. He
completely severed the spinal chord in one place, so that between its
two parts no histological connection existed, but only physical
contact. When he then picked up the rythm simultaneously from two
places on either side of the cut, the synchronization of the waves on
the two sides was not in the least disturbed. Since Gerard and Libet
have also demonstrated similar phenomena in the frogs brain, there is
no longer any doubt: active elements of the nervous system are
surrounded by electric fields or currents which spread in the tissue
as a continuous conductor..."
[2] Koehler W. (1971) Psychology and Natural Science. In:
The Selected Papers of Wolfgang Koehler, Mary Henle (Ed.)
Liveright, New York. pp 252-273.
[3] Koehler W. (1957) Psychologie und Naturwissenschaft. Proceedings of
the 15th International Congress of Psychology, Brussels, 37-50.
Reprinted by permission of the North-Holland Publishing Company, and
translated by Mary Henle.]