Cell morphology and the organization of enzymatic systems in cytoplasm

Abstract

The past development of biological sciences demonstrates that any significant advance, is the result of technical progress, or follows the application of new methods borrowed from other fields. One may wonder what credit would have remained attached to the wise writings of Claude Bernard if he had not been guided, in some of his inquiries, by a tool as simple as the reaction between iodine and glycogen. A slight improvement in the resolving power of microscopic lenses, brought about around the year 1827 by Amici, who succeeded in correcting the optical aberrations of the early microscopes, terminated a deadlock that had lasted for nearly one hundred and fifty years. Cells were seen, and almost immediately recognized as the basic units of living matter. In the next hundred and ten years or so, exploration of the interior of the cell itself was mostly confined to microscopical observation. All the morphological elements of the cell that could be seen by means of the microscope were discovered and, for good measure, some artifacts such as the Golgi apparatus. As regards the organization of the cell and the chemical constitution of its parts, the information gathered derived mostly from indirect observations, and the meaning of tests performed under the microscope remained generally doubtful. For this reason our knowledge of the cell constitution has been until recently, and to a large extent, a morphological concept.