The Neural Crest and Its Derivatives

Abstract

In 1868 Wilhelm His discovered the neural crest and he traced the origin of spinal and cranial ganglia from the neural crest (Fig. 4.1). These discoveries raised several theoritical problems—the origin and boundaries of the neural crest, the modes of cell migration, and the fates of cells of neural crest origin. For the past century these problems—origin, migration, and fate—have been the manun conceptual platforms from which research programs on neural crest development have been launched.

The principle, whereby the germinal discs of organ rudiments are presented in a planar pattern, and conversely, every single point of the germinal disc reappears in an organ, I name the prinsiple of organ-forming germinal regions.

Wilhelm His (1831–1904), Unsere Körperform, p. 19, 1874

... a physiological system...is not a sum of elements to be distinguished from each other and analyzed discretely, but a pattern, that is to say a form, a structure; the elements existence does not precede the existence of the whole, it comes neither before nor after it, for the parts do not determine the pattern, but the pattern determines the parts: knowledge of the pattern and of its laws, of the set and its structure, could not possibly be derived from discrete knowledge of the elements that compose it.

Georges Perec (1936–1982), “La vie, mode d’emploi” (1978)