Charles-Édouard Brown-Séquard. An eventful life and a significant contribution to the study of the nervous system

Abstract This is an account of the life of a 19th-century physiologist who was born in 1817 in Port-Louis (Mauritius Island, formerly ‘Ile de France’) and died in Paris in 1894. His mother tongue, education and medical training were French, but as the ‘Ile de France’ had become British a few years before his birth, he was a British citizen and therefore ineligible for a permanent position in a French institution. This explains, partly at least, his eventful life, during which he restlessly wandered during several decades between France, the United States, Great Britain and Mauritius, without ever finding a position that would satisfy him. This difficult period lasted until 1879 when, having finally acquired French nationality, he succeeded Claude Bernard in the chair of experimental medicine at the ‘College de France’. Some of his contributions to the physiology of the nervous system are analysed: sensory pathways in the spinal cord, vasoconstrictor innervation, nervous inhibition and experimental epilepsy. To cite this article: Y. Laporte, C. R. Biologies 329 (2006).