Joseph von Gerlach

Who was Joseph von Gerlach?

Joseph von Gerlach was a German professor of anatomy at the University of Erlangen. He was a native of Mainz, Rhineland-Palatinate. Gerlach was a pioneer of histological staining and anatomical micrography. In 1858 Gerlach introduced carmine mixed with gelatin as an histological stain.

Along with Camillo Golgi, he was a major proponent of the reticular theory that the brain's nervous system consisted of processes of contiguous cells fused to create a massive meshed network. Gerlach summed up his theory by stating:

the finest divisions of the protoplasmic processes ultimately take part in the formation of the fine nerve fibre network which I consider to be an essential constituent of the gray matter of the spinal cord. The divisions are none other than the beginnings of this nerve fibre net. The cells of the gray matter are therefore doubly connected by means the nerve process which becomes the axis fibre and through the finest branches of the protoplasmic processes which become a part of the fine nerve fibre net of the gray matter.

The reticular theory predominated until the 1890s when Ramon y Cajal brought forth his neuron doctrine of synaptic junctions, which in essence replaced the reticular theory.