Francesco Gennari

Front page of Gennari's book

Illustration by Francesco Gennari showing his discovery

Francesco Gennari (born 4 October 1750 in Mattaleto di Langhirano; died 4 December 1797) was an Italian anatomist. He is known for line of Gennari, a macroscopically white band seen in the cerebral cortex of occipital lobe, which he observed on 2 February 1776 in the course of examining frozen sections of unstained human brain during his study in medical school. He mentioned it in his book "De peculiari structura cerebri, nonnulisque ejus morbis" and referred to it as "lineola albidior". This discovery is considered the first evidence that the cerebral cortex was not uniform in structure.^[1]

Biography

Gennari attended medical school in Parma and received a medical degree in 1776. He died young, penniless and compulsive gambler.^[2]

References

↑ Clarke, Edwin; O'Malley, Charles Donald (1 January 1996). "The Human Brain and Spinal Cord: A Historical Study Illustrated by Writings from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century". Norman Publishing – via Google Books.
↑ Rockland, Kathleen S.; Kaas, Jon H.; Peters, Alan (31 January 1998). "Cerebral Cortex: Volume 12: Extrastriate Cortex in Primates". Springer Science & Business Media – via Google Books.

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[1] Clarke, Edwin; O'Malley, Charles Donald (1 January 1996). "The Human Brain and Spinal Cord: A Historical Study Illustrated by Writings from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century". Norman Publishing – via Google Books.

[2] Rockland, Kathleen S.; Kaas, Jon H.; Peters, Alan (31 January 1998). "Cerebral Cortex: Volume 12: Extrastriate Cortex in Primates". Springer Science & Business Media – via Google Books.