Discovery

Abstract

In 1868, Wilhelm His (1831–1904), a Swiss embryologist, identified a band of cells sandwiched between the developing neural tube and the future epidermal ectoderm in neurula-stage chick embryos as the source of spinal and cranial ganglia. His called this band Zwischenstrang—the intermediate cord. At the time of his discovery, His was professor of anatomy and physiology in his native Basel and an influential member of the city parliament. A man of many accomplishments, His also invented, in 1866, a microtome with a system for measuring section thickness when cutting thin, serial sections of animal and plant material. He discovered that nerve fibers arise from single nerve cells and coined the term neuroblasts for those cells, and, in 1895, wrote Nomina Anatomica, the treatise that introduced order into anatomical terminology. His also rediscovered the burial place of Johann Sebastian Bach and identified the skull by comparing a clay reconstruction of the skull with paintings of Bach.¹