Alexander Dogiel

Alexander Stanislavovich Dogiel (in Russian Александр Станиславович Догель), was born in 1852 in Panevėžys (Poniewiech) (today in Lithuania) and died in 1922 in Saint Petersburg (Russia). He was a Russian histologist and neuroscientist.

Biographical Summary

He studied at Kazan University where he graduated in 1883. He inaugurated his career in 1885 as a monitor in embryology. Then he taught and practiced histology, first in Tomsk from 1888, then in 1892 at the Saint Petersburg Medical Institute where he was entrusted with the organization of the histology laboratory. He is the founder of the Russian Archives of Anatomy, Histology and Embryology (Рус, архив анатомии, Gistology and Embryology).

Dogiel lived and worked in isolation, rarely but authoritatively publishing lengthy and richly illustrated articles. His work has focused on degenerative and regenerative neuromuscular junction abnormalities, neuromuscular spindles, and various cellular categories within the central nervous system. He demonstrates an astonishing mastery of silver staining techniques and some of his illustrations are close by their details of the images that can be obtained using the low-power electronic microscope.

Dogiel was an important figure in Russian histology. He trained Russian scientists such as Vladimir Bekhterev, Babukin, Yakulovich and Doinnikov in this specialty , but never went to visit his colleagues from Western Europe.

Major works

• Die sensiblen Nervenendigungen im Herzen und in den Blutgefässen der Säugethiere. Archiv für Mikroskopische Anatomie 1898; 52: 44-70.
• Die Endigungen des sensiblen Nerven in den Augenmuskeln und deren Sehnen beim Menschen und den Saugietieren. Arch Mikr Anat 1906; 68 : 501-22.
• Der Bau der Spinalganglien des Menschen und der Säugetiere. Jena: Fischer, 1908

Eponimous

Alexandre Dogiel left his name to the bipolar neurons of the spinal ganglia , the "cells of Dogiel".