Camillo Golgi: biography of this revolutionary Italian cytologist

The Italian physiologist Camillo Golgi (1843-1926) is recognized as one of the fathers of cell biology. He specifically is known for developing a technique that revolutionized modern science: the silver staining technique, or the Golgi technique. Not only that, but there are different cell tissues that to this day bear his name.

In this article we will see a short biography of Camillo Golgi and we will review some of the most important features of his life and his scientific legacy.

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Biography of Camillo Golgi: life of a pioneer of cytology

Camillo Golgi was born on July 7, 1843 in the city of Corteno, present-day province of Brescia, in Italy. In the year 1865 he graduated with a medical degree from the University of Padua, and began practicing it in the psychiatric and criminological area. Nevertheless, his interest soon turned to histology (the discipline that studies the structure, development and functions of organ tissues).

Specifically while working in the laboratory of experimental pathology at the hands of histology professor Giulio Bizzozero, Golgi took an important interest in the development of experimentation and investigation techniques of the same discipline.

Later, while working as a physicist in a research residency for people with chronic disorders (in the laboratory of the Chronicity Hospital III, in Abbiategrasso, Italy), Golgi developed a method that was decisive for the advancement of science in terms of knowing our composition cell phone.

He also worked as a professor at the University of Torí him and the University of Siena and finally became a professor of histology at the University of Pavia. Within the same university he was appointed coordinator of the department of medicine and later rector.

Camillo Golgi is recognized as one of the most important physicists and biologists for the development of modern science, especially for the neurosciences of the late 19th century and early 20th century xx.

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The Golgi method and the neural network

Between the years of 1872 and 1875, Camillo Golgi worked as a physiologist in a residence for people with chronic neuronal disorders in Italy. Golgi developed a method that to this day is known precisely as the "golgi technique".

It is a basic histological procedure that very broadly consists of combining different chemicals and then depositing them in the intracellular walls. More specifically it is about produce a chemical reaction between potassium dichromate and silver nitrate, which results in a chemical compound called silver chromate, also known as silver chromate, whose formula is Ag2CrO4.

In visual terms, it is a set of red salts, without color or taste, which has different reactions when in contact with different elements. Among other things, silver chromate is one of the compounds that has allowed us to develop modern photographic printing.

What Golgi discovered, and later Ramón y Cajal perfected, was that it was possible stain cell tissues using silver chromate, and by doing this, the parts that make up these tissues could be clearly visible to human eyes.

This is how it became possible for the first time to take and print pictures of our cells. Specifically, Golgi discovered a type of cell, now known as the "golgi cell", which has different extensions (dendrites) that serve to connect with other cells.

Stain applied to neurons

After going through different processes to refine the technique, Golgi and Ramón y Cajal applied the silver staining technique to visualize the composition of neurons. Thus, they found that neurons did not exist in isolation and were not connected by continuity, but rather by contiguity, which It means that their connections occur directly through different axons that communicate each neuronal body with the following.

They described this as a kind of mesh or neural network and were the first to take clear impressions of such a network. In addition, they maintained that the basic structure of the nervous system is precisely the neurons, something that was revolutionary for neuroscientific studies of the time, and that is an essential part of the development of contemporary neuroscience.

Recognition and scientific legacy

The silver staining technique applied to the study of neurons earned Golgi and Ramón y Cajal the Nobel Prize in Physiology in 1906. In addition to this award, in 1913 Golgi became a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences and upon his retirement he was professor emeritus at the University of Pavia.

On the other hand, one of the most popular and representative works of the Golgi legacy is the note titled “On the structure of the gray matter of the brain”, published by the Italian medical journal from 1873. In the following years Golgi continued to publish different articles with images of cellular networks. In addition credited with discovering the sensory bodies of tendons, which are now known as the “golgi tendon” organs.