Camillo Golgi

Infobox_Scientist
name = Camillo Golgi


image_width = 150px
caption = Camillo Golgi, 1906
birth_date = birth date|1843|7|7|mf=y
birth_place = Corteno, Italy
death_date = death date and age|1926|01|21|1843|7|7
death_place = Pavia, Italy
residence =
citizenship =
ethnicity =
nationality = Italian
field = Neuroscience
work_institution =
alma_mater =
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author_abbreviation_bot =
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prizes = Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1906)
religion =
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Camillo Golgi (July 7, 1843 – January 21, 1926) was an Italian physician and scientist.

Biography

Camillo Golgi was born in Corteno (Brescia). His father was a Physician and district medical officer. Golgi studied at University of Pavia, where he worked in the experimental pathology laboratory under Giulio Bizzozero, who elucidated the properties of bone marrow. He graduated in 1865. He spent much of his career studying the central nervous system. Tissue staining techniques in the latter half of the 19th century were inadequate for studying nervous tissue. While working as chief medical officer in a psychiatric hospital, he experimented with metal impregnation of nervous tissue, using mainly silver (silver staining). He discovered a method of staining nervous tissue which would stain a limited number of cells at random, in their entirety. This enabled him to view the paths of nerve cells in the brain for the first time. He called his discovery the "black reaction" (in Italian, "reazione nera"), which later received his name (Golgi's method) or Golgi stain. The reason for the random staining is still not understood.

The black reaction consisted in fixing silver chromate particles to the neurilemma (the neuron membrane) by reacting silver nitrate with potassium dichromate. This resulted in a stark black deposit on the soma as well as on the axon and all dendrites, providing an exceedingly clear and well contrasted picture of neuron against a yellow background. The ability to visualize separate neurons led to the eventual acceptance of the neuron doctrine. [ The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences (1999) The MIT Press Bradford book, by Kathleen S. Rockland p 353]

In addition to this discovery, Golgi discovered a tendon sensory organ that bears his name (Golgi receptor). He studied the life cycle of "Plasmodium falciparum" and related the timing of fevers seen in malaria with the life cycle of this organism. Using his staining technique, Golgi identified the intracellular reticular apparatus in 1898 which bears his name, the Golgi apparatus.

In renal physiology Golgi is renowned for being the first to show that the distal tubulus of the nephron returns to its originating glomerulus (nerve ending of the Bombula) a finding that he published in 1889 ("Annotazioni intorno all'Istologia dei reni dell'uomo e di altri mammifieri e sull'istogenesi dei canalicoli oriniferi". "Rendiconti R. Acad. Lincei" 5: 545-557, 1889.).

Golgi, together with Santiago Ramón y Cajal, received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1906 for his studies of the structure of the nervous system.

Golgi died in Pavia, Italy, in January 1926.

Golgi’s landmarks in Pavia

In Pavia several landmarks stand as Golgi’s memory.
*A marble statue, in a yard of the old buildings of the University of Pavia, at N.65 of the central “Strada Nuova”. On the basament, there is the following inscription in Italian language: "Camillo Golgi / patologo sommo / della scienza istologica / antesignano e maestro / la segreta struttura / del tessuto nervoso / con intenta vigilia / sorprese e descrisse / qui operò / qui vive / guida e luce ai venturi / MDCCCXLIII - MCMXXVI" ("Camillo Golgi / outstanding pathologist / of histological science / precursor and master / the secret structure / of the nervous tissue / with strenuous effort / discovered and described / here he worked / here he lives / here he guides and enlightens future scholars / 1843 - 1926)".
*"Golgi’s home", also in Strada Nuova, at N.77, a few hundreds meters away from the University, just in front to the historical “Teatro Fraschini”. It is the home in which Golgi spent the most of his family life, with his wife Lina.
*Golgi’s tomb is in the Monumental Cemetery of Pavia (viale San Giovannino), along the central lane, just before the big monument to the fallen of the First World War. It is a very simple granite grave, with a bronze medallion representing the scientist’s profile. Near Golgi’s tomb, apart from his wife, two other important Italian medical scientists are buried: Bartolomeo Panizza and Adelchi Negri.

References

*Citation
id = PMID:17490748
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17490748
last=De Carlos
first=Juan A
last2=Borrell
first2=José
publication-date=2007 August
year=2007
title=A historical reflection of the contributions of Cajal and Golgi to the foundations of neuroscience.
volume=55
issue=1
periodical=Brain research reviews
pages=8-16
doi = 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.03.010
*Citation
id = PMID:17462742
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17462742
last=Muscatello
first=Umberto
publication-date=2007 August
year=2007
title=Golgi's contribution to medicine.
volume=55
issue=1
periodical=Brain research reviews
pages=3-7
doi = 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.03.007
*Citation
id = PMID:17408565
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17408565
last=Kruger
first=Lawrence
publication-date=2007 October
year=2007
title=The sensory neuron and the triumph of Camillo Golgi.
volume=55
issue=2
periodical=Brain research reviews
pages=406-10
doi = 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.01.008
*Citation
id = PMID:9865850
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9865850
last=Dröscher
first=A
publication-date=1998 October
year=1998
title=The history of the Golgi apparatus in neurones from its discovery in 1898 to electron microscopy.
volume=47
issue=3
periodical=Brain Res. Bull.
pages=199-203
*Citation
id = PMID:9865849
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9865849
last=Fabene
first=P F
last2=Bentivoglio
first2=M
publication-date=1998 October
year=1998
title=1898-1998: Camillo Golgi and "the Golgi": one hundred years of terminological clones.
volume=47
issue=3
periodical=Brain Res. Bull.
pages=195-8
*Citation
id = PMID:9778732
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9778732
last=Mironov
first=A A
last2=Komissarchik
first2=Ia Iu
last3=Mironov
first3=A A
last4=Snigirevskaia
first4=E S
publication-date=1998
year=1998
title= [Current concept of structure and function of the Golgi apparatus. On the 100-anniversary of the discovery by Camillo Golgi]
volume=40
issue=6
periodical=Tsitologiia
pages=483-96
*Citation
id = PMID:9695800
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9695800
last=Farquhar
first=M G
last2=Palade
first2=G E
publication-date=1998 January
year=1998
title=The Golgi apparatus: 100 years of progress and controversy.
volume=8
issue=1
periodical=Trends Cell Biol.
pages=2-10
*Citation
id = PMID:9610881
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9610881
last=Bentivoglio
first=M
publication-date=1998 May
year=1998
title=1898: the Golgi apparatus emerges from nerve cells.
volume=21
issue=5
periodical=Trends Neurosci.
pages=195-200

External links

* [http://nobelprize.org/medicine/articles/golgi/index.html Life and Discoveries of Camillo Golgi]
* [http://nobelprize.org/medicine/laureates/1906/index.html The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1906]
* [http://himetop.wikidot.com/camillo-golgi Some places and memories related to Camillo Golgi]
* [http://museogolgi.it/ The museum in Corteno, now called Corteno Golgi, dedicated to Golgi. Includes a gallery of images of his birthplace.]