Renewed inquiries concerning the spiral structure of muscle, with observations on the muscularity of cilia / by Martin Barry, M.D.

  • Barry, M. (Martin), 1802-1855.
Date:
[1852]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Renewed inquiries concerning the spiral structure of muscle, with observations on the muscularity of cilia / by Martin Barry, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    see in them the spii-al structure with such distinctness, as to feel astonished at its not having been long since observed. As the tails of spermatozoa of course correspond to cilia, their struc- ture must be essentially the same. He states it to be now nine years since he published his observation of the spiral structure of the tail of the mammiferous spermatozoon (Phil. Trans. 1842, p. 107). It is probably owing to a like refractive power in the spirals and in the hyaline which lies between them, that the spirals are so difficult to distinguish in the tails of spermatozoa; and hence it no doubt is that they were not observed before. The subject of the present paper being the structure of muscle, the author has avoided the special mention of other tissues. Lest, however, from this omission it should be supposed that he has abandoned his views,—that the structure of all the element- ary fibres, as well of plants as of animals, is originally spiral,— he thinks it right before concluding briefly to declare that those views remain unchanged. Bowman says : Dr. Barry might as well have entitled his paper ' On the Spiral Structure of the Organic World*.' To this title, satirically proposed by Bow- man, the author remarks that he has not the least objection; so far, indeed, is he from being thereby annoyed, that he thanks him for it. He thanks Prof. Bowman for having thus recorded in the Cyclopsedia of Anatomy and Physiology, as far back as in the year 1842, that his (Dr. Barry's) views in regard to the spiral structui'e of organic fibre were universal in their character; and I am convinced, it is added, that the day will come when my views will be as universally adopted by physiologists, as I myself am convinced that the spiral structm-e is universal. Let it only be fully understood what those views are. ^Tiat I maintain is, that the spiral form of fibre eveiywhere is the ori- ginal and incipient form; and that if this fonn be lost in many tissues in the course of their special development, it remains permanent in the fibre of muscle as a necessary attribute of its function. In a postscript it is added, that in the contractile stem of the Bell polype (Vorticella convallaria), of which several specimens were examined, the author found his double spiral. In relaxa- tion, this double spiral lay in its extended cylindrical gelatinous sheath, (which he regards as its elastic sarcolemma) in [elon- gated] spiral winds. In contraction, it presented itself in a manner about the same as that in fig. 18; with this difference, that the double spiral in the polype was enclosed in its gelati- nous sarcolemma, which that figure, representing quite another object, docs not show. * Cyclopaedia of Anat. and Phys., ait. Muscle and Muscular Motion, p. 511.