History of mediterranean Neuroscience: The path to N€uroMed

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event History of mediterranean Neuroscience: The path to N€uroMed Wail Benjelloun1* 1 Mohammed V University, ISB, Morocco Throughout recorded history, the Mediterranean basin has been a cradle of civilizations and a receptacle for the knowledge developed by mankind. This is especially true in philosophy and in the physical and natural sciences. Among the latter, the neurosciences have occupied a special place in view of man’s interest in his own functions and in the determinants of his actions. In Mesopotamia, 4 000 years before Jesus Christ, Sumerian “neuropharmacologists” resorted to poppy seeds to provoke euphoria. One thousand years later, the Edwin Smith papyrus described 48 clinical cases of spinal injury treated by the pharaonic priest Imhotep, who for the first time linked CNS insults (crushed vertebral nerves) to peripheral symptoms (incontinence, priapism). In Greece, Hippocrates (470-360 BC) wrote several volumes on brain surgery with detailed descriptions of spasms resulting from injury, contusions and cranial depression. With the advent of Christianity, the Roman surgeon, Aulus Cornelius Celsus developed a reputation for the treatment of fractures resulting from cranial depressions. After the fall of Rome in 476, Europe entered the Dark Ages, an era of decline, low literacy, and hardship, in which the study of anatomy was prohibited. But the European Dark Ages were the golden age of Islam. Just a hundred and twenty years after the death of the prophet Muhammad in 632, Persia, Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine, Egypt,the whole of North Africa and the Andalus were under Islamic influence. The Muslims assimilated the cultures of the converted peoples and translated Greek, Roman and Persian manuscripts into Arabic, adding scholarly commentary. During this Muslim Golden Age, Muslim scholars contributed to all fields of knowledge, including, of course, medicine and the study of the nervous system. Avicenna, Al Razi, and Al Baghdadi all contributed to the study of pain, developing the use of plant anesthetics and ice. Avicenna described how to treat paralysis through cooling rather than the traditional Greek method of heating, and used eels to deliver shocks to epileptic patients, anticipating modern electroshock therapy. He also developed cataract extraction and described the diagnostic use of the pupillary reaction to light. Al Zahrawi described intra- and extra-cranial hemorrhages and developed craniotomy procedures using burr holes. Al Hazen described the optical pathways from the retina to the cranial hemispheres. During the European renaissance, many of these descriptions, discoveries and clinical methods were adopted by European physicians. Even if Granada, the last vestige of Muslim influence in Europe, had already fallen, the knowledge produced in the Muslim world did not disappear but lived on. This is what is still happening today: present advances in Mediterranean neuroscience are the product of a collective intelligence distributed around the Mediterranean countries, that in most cases has not only avoided the destruction of knowledge produced by others, but has adopted it for its own use. N€uromed and other forms of cooperation around the Mare Nostrum are the modern manifestations of an ancient tradition. Conference: 2nd NEUROMED Workshop, Fez, Morocco, 10 Jun - 12 Jun, 2010. Presentation Type: Oral Presentation Topic: Plenary lecture Citation: Benjelloun W (2010). History of mediterranean Neuroscience: The path to N€uroMed. Front. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: 2nd NEUROMED Workshop. doi: 10.3389/conf.fnins.2010.12.00046 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 04 Jun 2010; Published Online: 04 Jun 2010. * Correspondence: Wail Benjelloun, Mohammed V University, ISB, Rabat, Morocco, wbenj@fsr.ac.ma Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Wail Benjelloun Google Wail Benjelloun Google Scholar Wail Benjelloun PubMed Wail Benjelloun Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.