Editing Histology (section)

==History==
[[File:Cajal-va.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[Santiago Ramón y Cajal]] in his laboratory]]
In the 17th century the Italian [[Marcello Malpighi]] used microscopes to study tiny biological entities; some regard him as the founder of the fields of histology and microscopic pathology.<ref name="Bracegirdle, 1977" /><ref name="Motta 1998" /> Malpighi analyzed several parts of the organs of bats, frogs and other animals under the microscope. While studying the structure of the lung, Malpighi noticed its membranous alveoli and the hair-like connections between veins and arteries, which he named capillaries. His discovery established how the oxygen breathed in enters the blood stream and serves the body.<ref name="Adelmann and Malpighi, 1966" />

In the 19th century histology was an academic discipline in its own right. The French anatomist [[Xavier Bichat]] introduced the concept of [[Tissue (biology)|tissue]] in anatomy in 1801,<ref name="Bichat, 1801" /> and the term "histology" ({{langx |de| Histologie}}), coined to denote the "study of tissues", first appeared in a book by [[August Franz Josef Karl Mayer|Karl Meyer]] in 1819.<ref name="Mayer, 1891" /><ref name="bock" /><ref name="Bracegirdle, 1977" /> Bichat described twenty-one human tissues, which can be subsumed under the four categories currently accepted by histologists.<ref name="Rather, 1978" /> The usage of illustrations in histology, deemed as useless by Bichat, was promoted by [[Jean Cruveilhier]].<ref>
{{cite book
 | last = Meli | first = Domenico Bertoloni
 | name-list-style = vanc | year = 2017
 | title = Visualizing disease: the art and history of pathological illustrations
 | location = Chicago
 | publisher = The University of Chicago Press
}}{{page needed|date= August 2018}}
</ref>{{when|date=June 2019}}

In the early 1830s [[Jan Evangelista Purkyně|Purkynĕ]] invented a microtome with high precision.<ref name=bock/>

During the 19th century many [[Fixation (histology)|fixation]] techniques were developed by [[Adolph Hannover]] (solutions of [[Chromate and dichromate|chromate]]s and [[chromic acid]]), [[Franz Eilhard Schulze|Franz Schulze]] and [[Max Schultze]] ([[osmic acid]]), [[Alexander Butlerov]] ([[formaldehyde]]) and [[Benedikt Stilling]] ([[Frozen section procedure|freezing]]).<ref name=bock/>

[[Microscope slide#Mounting|Mounting]] techniques were developed by [[Rudolf Heidenhain]] (1824–1898), who introduced [[gum Arabic]]; [[Salomon Stricker]] (1834–1898), who advocated a mixture of wax and oil; and [[Andrew Pritchard]] (1804–1884) who, in 1832, used a gum/[[isinglass]] mixture. In the same year, [[Canada balsam]] appeared on the scene, and in 1869 [[Edwin Klebs]] (1834–1913) reported that he had for some years embedded his specimens in paraffin.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Bock|first=Ortwin|date=2015-01-05|title=A history of the development of histology up to the end of the nineteenth century|url=http://www.labome.org/research/A-history-of-the-development-of-histology-up-to-the-end-of-the-nineteenth-century.html|journal=Research|access-date=2018-05-03|archive-date=2021-04-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210413202849/http://www.labome.org/research/A-history-of-the-development-of-histology-up-to-the-end-of-the-nineteenth-century.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The 1906 [[Nobel Prize]] in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to histologists [[Camillo Golgi]] and [[Santiago Ramon y Cajal]]. They had conflicting interpretations of the neural structure of the brain based on differing interpretations of the same images. Ramón y Cajal won the prize for his correct theory, and Golgi for the [[silver staining|silver-staining]] [[Golgi's method|technique]] that he invented to make it possible.<ref name="NobelPrize1906" />