Francesco Gennari

Why this artist matters now

Francesco Gennari was an Italian anatomist. He is known for line of Gennari, a macroscopically white band seen in the cerebral cortex of the occipital lobe, which he observed on 2 February 1776 in the course of examining ice-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 (1782), and referred to it as lineola albidior.None of the anatomists I happened to read have taught that in addition to the cortical and medullary substance there is in the brain another substance which I am accustomed to call the third substance of this organ. ... it can be found with difficulty or it is somewhat obscure in the anterior part of the brain, but it can be detected more and more clearly in the posterior part of the brain.

Source: Artsy · Trust score: 85% · Updated 1mo ago