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Luigi Rolando
Italian anatomist, born June 16, 1773, Torino; died April 20, 1831, Torino.
Associated eponyms:
Rolandic vein occlusion syndrome
Progressively developing hemiplegia associated with sensory and motor disturbances.
Rolandis epilepsy
The most common focal epilepsy syndrome in child age.
Rolando's angle
The angle of he fissure of Rolando to the midplane.
Rolando's area
Motor area in the cerebral cortex.
Rolando's cells
Ganglion cells in Rolando's gelatinous substance.
Rolando's column
A slight ridge on either side of the medulla oblongata related to the descending trigeminal tract and nucleus.
Rolando's fissure
The central fissure of the cerebral hemisphere
Rolando's gelatinous substance
The apical part of the posterior horn of the spinal cord's gray matter composed largely of very small nerve cells.
Rolando's tubercle
A longitudinal prominence on the dorsolateral surface of the medulla oblongata along the lateral border of the tuberculum cuneatum.
Biography:
Luigi Rolando’s father died when he was a child. Luigi, his brother and sister, were then taken into the care of their maternal uncle, the priest Antonio Maffei, who raised them and attended to their education.
Rolando enrolled at the Faculty of Medicine in his native city. Here he showed particular interest in the anatomy courses of Giovanni Francesco Cigna (1734-1790), who considered Rolando his most promising pupil. However, he also devoted time to studies in comparative anatomy and zoology. He obtained his doctorate in 1793 with a thesis on an anatomical and physiological study of the lungs in various classes of animals.
Rolando completed his medical courses in 1802 with a dissertation “On Lung Structure and Function in Every Class of Animal and on the Changes Caused by Phthisis” Before he could practice independently, Rolando had to take a fellowship with an accredited physician and so he chose Dr. Anformi, a famous general practitioner who introduced him to the practice of medicine and to the best circles of the Torino.
That year the Piedmont region was annexed by Napoleonic France and the king, Vittorio Emanuele (1820-1878) had to escape. He retreated to Sardinia, taking with him his court and a few eminent people. Rolando was invited to take up the Chair of Practical Medicine at the University of Sassari, Sardinia, the temporary capital city. He accepted gratefully and set off for the port of Livorno to board ship for Sardinia, but misfortune intervened. An epidemic of yellow fever meant that access to the port was prohibited, and Rolando was unable to depart. As a result, he stayed in the nearby city of Florence, where he became friends with Paolo Mascagni (1752–1815) and Felice Fontana (1730-1805). Fontana had already described the appearance of nerves under the microscope, and Mascagni was a master in the dissection and preparation of anatomical specimens. In Florence, the world capital of art in his time, Rolando also studied drawing and engraving to illustrate his writings himself.
On November 15, 1804, he was appointed to the chair of practical medicine at Sassari University, Sardinia, and in 1807 he finally moved to Sardinia to assume his chair of practical medicine as well as the post of chief physician.
Rolando’s anatomico-physiological studies from this period dealt mainly with the structure and function of the nervous system in man and animals, using the comparative method with which he had become familiar. In the meantime he also continued zoological research.
In 1814 Rolando accompanied the royal family on its return from Sardinia to Torino and became professor of anatomy at Torino University, in addition to his various posts in scientific and health organizations. He was also Hofmedicus and physician to Maria Theresia of Austria. Despite this combination of engagements, which considerably weakened his health, he published an exceptional number of articles and works on entomology, zoology, general physiology, and pathology.
In 1824, Rolando visited London and Paris. He wanted to publicize his theories in Paris in answer to Flourens, who clarified cerebellar function without acknowledging Rolando’s preliminary work, from which Flourens might have taken the original idea. It was during this period that he first complained of symptoms of a gastric disease, which was to cut short his life. He died of cancer of the pylorus in 1831.
His work
Rolando’s most important studies were devoted to the anatomical, physiological, and embryological examination of the brain. In particular, he examined the gray matter, which he considered to be different from that of the striate bodies. He also discovered the cerebral branches and fibrous processes, which he studied by means of serial sections. Contradicting existing opinion, Rolando asserted that in the first stages of development of the central nervous system of the embryo two vesicles appear, representing the medulla oblongata, from which the cerebral hemispheres are then developed; to the latter he attributed the intellectual faculties.
Experimental research on the cerebellum led him to consider, before Marie Jean Pierre Flourens (1794-1867) – with whom he had an argument on the priority of the discovery – that this organ governs muscular movements. Rolando had observed that in animals in which lesions of this organ are induced, such movements progressively decrease until they disappear entirely, parallel with the extent and seriousness of the damage. Flourens then correctly restricted the functions of the cerebellum to the coordination of movement, but he refused to acknowledge that Rolando had preceded him along this course.
Rolando conducted experiments in 1809 involving the removal of the cerebral hemisphere and cerebellum from animals. He also used electric current to stimulate the cortex. Based on his observations, he correctly concluded that the cerebrum controlled voluntary body functions and the cerebellum controlled involuntary functions.
Rolando dissected Broca’s area nearly forty years before Broca; he referred to this circumannular convolution as the prosesso cristato.
Bibliography:
- Anatomico-physiologica comparativa disquisito in respirationis organa.
Title also given as: Anatomes physiologica comparata disquisitio in respirationis organa.
Torino, 1801. 2nd edition in two volumes, 1819.
- Phthiseos pulmonalis specimen theoretico-practicum. Torino, 1801.
- Observations anatomiques sur la structure du sphinx nerii et autres insectes. Sassari, 1805.
- Sulle cause da cui dipende la vita negli esseri organizzati. Firenze, 1807.
[Concerning the Causes on Which the Life of Organisms Depends]
- Saggio sopra la vera struttura del cervello dell’uomo e degli ainamli e sopra le funzioni del’ sistema nervoso.
Sassari, Stamp. Privileg, 1809. 2nd edition, 2 volumes, Torino, 1828.
Includes description of Rolando’s substance, Rolando’s tubercle, and Rolando’s funiculus.
Rolando was correct in allocating motor activity to the cerebral hemispheres; however his views on cerebellar function were replaced by those advanced by Florens.
- Humani corporis fabricae ac functionum analysis adumbrata. Torino, 1817.
- Osservazioni sulla pleura e sul peritoneo. Torino, 1818.
- Anatomes physiologica. Torino, 1819.
- Cenni fisico-patologici sulle differenti specie e’eccitabilità e d’eccitamento, sull’irritazione e sulle potenze eccitanti, debilitanti e irritanti.
Torino, 1821.
- Riflessioni e sperimenti tendenti allo scioglimento di alcune questioni riguardanti la respirazione e la calorificazione. Torino, 1821.
- Osservazioni sul cerbelletto. Torino, 1823.
- Description d’un animal nouveau qui appartient à la classe des échinodermes.
Memorie della reale Accademia delle scienze di Torino, 1821, 26: 539-556.
- Richerche anatomiche sulla struttura del midolla spinale. Torino, 1824.
- Recherches anatomiques sur la moelle allongée.
Memorie della reale Accademia delle scienze di Torino, 1825; 29: 1-78.
- Osservazioni sul cervelletto.
Memorie della reale Accademia delle scienze di Torino, 1825, 29: 163-188.
- Sperimenti sul fascicoli de midolla spinale. Torino, 1828.
- Manuale di anatomia fisiologica. Milano, 1829.
- Della struttura degli emisferi cerebrali. Torino, 1830.
Memorie della reale Accademia delle scienze di Torino, 1929, 35: 103-147.
- P. Capparoni:
Profil bio-bibliografici di medici e naturalisti celebri italiani.
Rome, 1928: 97-101. With portrait.
- August Hirsch (1817-1894), publisher:
Biographisches Lexikon der hervorragenden Ärzte aller Zeiten und Völker.
2nd edition. Berlin, Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1929.
First published in 6 volumes 1884-1888. 3rd edition, München 1962.
- Carlo Castellani:
Rolando, Luigi. In: Charles Coulston Gillispie, editor in chief: Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Charles Scribner’s Sons. New York, 1970. Volume 11: 510-511.
- Franco Caputi, Renato S. Paziante, Enrico de Divitiis and Blaine S. Nashold:
Historical Vignette: Luigi Rolando and his pioneering efforts to relate structure to function in the nervous system.
Journal of Neurosurgery, 1995, 83: 933–937.
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