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The Adrian-Zotterman Lecture: Cutaneous Sensation

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Advances in Physiological Research

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Abstract

Those are the words of Yngve Zotterman in his autobiography “Touch, Tickle and Pain” (1971). Everyone agrees with Adrian and Zotterman that the peripheral message to the brain occurs according to the principle of frequency modulation. But what is it in this laconic message that determines the qualities of sensation such as touch, tickle and pain? This very controversial issue is the topic of my lecture.

It is very simple: the (peripheral) nervous system is signalling with the simplest of all codes. It has only one sign — the spike, which follows the all-or-nothing principle…. Thus there is no amplitude modulation in the nerve fibres…. It is the impulse frequency alone which signals the strength of the stimulus. These fundamental principles of nervous transmission were first conceived by Adrian and me in Cambridge on a raw November day in 1925.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Clinical Neurophysiology, University Hospital, S-751 85, Uppsala, Sweden

    Erik Torebjörk

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  1. Erik Torebjörk
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

    H. McLennan , J. R. Ledsome , C. H. S. McIntosh  & D. R. Jones , ,  & 

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© 1987 Plenum Press, New York

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Torebjörk, E. (1987). The Adrian-Zotterman Lecture: Cutaneous Sensation. In: McLennan, H., Ledsome, J.R., McIntosh, C.H.S., Jones, D.R. (eds) Advances in Physiological Research. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-9492-5_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-9492-5_8

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4615-9494-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4615-9492-5

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