title: The historical significance of work with electric organs for the study of cholinergic transmission.
abstract: The historical significance of work with electric organs for the development of electrobiology and our understanding of the cholinergic synapse at the cell and molecular biological level is traced from its earliest beginning in folk medicine, through the controversy on bioelectricity between Galvani and Volta to the present day, the last decades of which have seen the sequencing of the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor, the isolation and biochemical characterization of the cholinergic vesicle and much else. In the concluding section of the review the continued relevance and usefulness of the electromotor system as a model for future neurobiological research is emphasized.
authors.affiliation: Arbeitsgruppe Neurochemie, Max-Planck-Institut für Biophysikalische Chemie, Postfach 2841, D-3400 Göttingen, F.R.G.
authors.forename: V P
authors.initials: VP
authors.lastname: Whittaker