Lord Edgar Douglas Adrian, 1. Baron OF Cambridge order of the OF Merit (* 30 November 1889 in London; "† 4 August 1977 in Cambridge) was a British Anatom and physiologist. For its discoveries in the area of the functions of the neurons it kept 1932 common with Charles Scott Sherrington to the Nobelpreis for medicine.

Biography

Edgar Douglas Adrian was the second son of Alfred Douglas Adrian and completed his school training to the Westminster School close of the Westminster Abbey in London. At 1908 it began its natural science study at the Trinity college in Cambridge. Its study concentrated thereby particularly on the physiology, it occupied however also all further central fan of the natural sciences and attained 1911 the Bachelor OF kind in five different academic subjects with excellent notes.

1913 received a research scholarship for its work to Adrian for the function mode of the nerves and it began in the same year a study of the medicine. Its clinical studies it completed thereby at the pc. Bartholomew's hospital in London and 1915 could it also this study successfully lock. Until 1919, thus during the entire 1. World war, he worked clinically within the field of the neurology and treated above all soldiers with different neurological illnesses. Afterwards it returned to Cambridge, where it worked at physiological Institut and gave courses to the human nervous system. Its research work focused at this time on the basic research of the sense physiology and the attraction line in the nerves. 1923 it became member of the Royal Society and starting from 1925 began it its work on sensory organs with electrical methods, which should bring in the Nobelpreis later for it.

On 14 June 1923 he married Hester Agnes Pinsent, with which he had three children. It concerned its daughter Anne Pinsent Adrian, the later wife of the physiologist Richard Keynes, as well as the twins Richard Hume Adrian, 2nd baron Adrian, who became physiologist and member of the Royal Society, as well as Jennet Adrian.

1929 became Adrian Foulerton professor of the Royal Society and 1937 replaced it Sir Joseph Barcroft as a professor for physiology at the university of Cambridge. It kept this chair until 1951, afterwards it became the director/conductor of the Trinity college until 1965. It in addition president of the Leicester University college were from 1955 to 1957, starting from 1958 chancellors of the University of Leicester and from 1957 to 1959 vice-chancellors of the university of Cambridge. From 1950 to 1955 he became a president of the Royal Society and 1954 in addition the British Association for the Advancement OF Science.

1942 were already taken up in order the OF Merit and appointed 1955 the 1st baron Adrian order of the OF Merit (COM). It died on 4 August 1977 in Cambridge.

Work

The earliest work Adrians to the neuro physiology took place already in its study together with Keith Lucas, which died 1916 with an aircraft crash. Adrian and Lucas tried to measure the nerve impulses failed however due to the very inaccurate Messemthoden and to a large extent unsuitable nerve preparations.

Edgar Douglas Adrian researched already early to "„all or nothing "“- law (ANG) in the excitation of nerves. 1925 it developed a method for the investigation and representation of very weak action potentials at individual nerves and muscle fibers. But it isolated individual nerve fibers and passed on into this gemessenenen electrical impulse at amplifiers, which were built in the radio industry. With this structure it could the very weak impulses, whose tension lies within the range of some Mikrovolt and whose impulse only few microseconds persists, make measurable and show that the excitation strength is independent of the strength of the single attraction separates alone on the frequency (frequency) of the impulses depends. It proved together with its coworkers that the attraction moved as electrical wave along the nerve and the electrical potential of the fiber was changed. Between the single pulses it proved besides a short Ruhepause, the By comparative investigations Adrian showed in addition that the fundamental nerve function does not differ from sensory and motor nerves.

In later work Adrian that nerves transport also substances from the to the synapses, showed among them amino acids, proteins and nutrients. After 1932 he dedicated the Entstehunh of electrical rhythms in the brain and 1934 encountered themselves he the work of Hans Berger over the Elektroenzephalographie and recognized the consequence of the discovery. Within the range of the sense physiology Adrian concentrated its work on the study of the sense of smell, in addition he worked on the receptors for the sense of balance in the interior ear as well as the linkages of the sensory and motor brain areas.

Works

Edgar Douglas Adrian published a set of publications in technical periodicals during his scientific career. In addition it wrote the following Monographien:

• The basis OF sensation (1927)
• The Mechanism OF Nervous Action (1932)
• Factors Determining human Behaviour (1937, in the author team).
• The Physical basis OF Perception (1947)

Literature

• Bernhard Kupfer: Encyclopedia of the , Patmos publishing house Duesseldorf 2001 (ISBN 3-491-72451-1)
• Brockhaus Nobelpreise - chronicle of outstanding achievements, Brockhaus, Mannheim 2004 (ISBN 3-7653-0492-1)

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