Hodgkin

Hodgkin

His full name is Sir Alan Lloyd Hodgkin (1914-1998). He is a British physiologist and cell biologist. He won the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for his pioneering research on the electrical excitation of nerve cells.

Life of the characters

Sir Alan Lloyd Hodgkin was born in Banbury, England, in 1914. He joined Trinity College of Cambridge University in 1932 and planned to engage in bird research. Later, he turned his interest to cell physiology and studied flatworms. Later, he worked with Andrew F. Huxley in Plymouth Marine Biology Association to explore the electrical activity on giant axons of squid nerve cells, and finally won the Nobel Prize.

Scientific contribution

(1) Hodgkin and Huxley explored the electrical excitations on the surface of axon plasma membrane of nerve cells with improved experimental methods. They stripped large single nerve axons (or nerve fibers) from squid and inserted special electrodes into the cell membrane of the axons without damaging the axons. Through the potential difference recorded inside and outside the membrane, they found that the sharp reversal of membrane potential occurred when the axons were excited. Their experiment is consistent with the experimental results of American K. Cole and h. J. Curtis, which jointly proved that the essence of nerve impulse is the rapid reversal of membrane potential on the surface of nerve fiber, namely action potential.

(2) Hodgkin and Huxley further proved that the action potential was due to the first influx of sodium ions into the membrane, resulting in the reversal of membrane potential, followed by the outflow of potassium ions out of the membrane, resulting in the recovery of membrane potential to a resting state, thus forming the ion theory of nerve impulse.

Hodgkin and others also demonstrated through experiments that when the protoplasm in the axon of squid is squeezed out, only the cell membrane is left, and then the appropriate electrolyte solution is poured into the membrane, the nerve impulse can be restored, thus confirming that the nerve impulse is only related to the membrane of nerve fiber. This achievement is helpful for the Nobel Committee to award the 1963 physiology or medicine prize to him, Huxley and Eccles.

Writing

TheConductionOfTheNervousImpulse

TheIonicBasisOfNervousConduction

Chinese PinYin : Huo Qi Jin