Electricity beyond the nerve
Bioelectrica is an Alterspan Labs encyclopedia of the electrical and energetic life of cells. It places historical books alongside research on membrane voltage, metabolism, regeneration and the organisation of living tissue.
These subjects connect questions often studied separately. A cell maintains ion differences across its membrane. Groups of cells exchange signals. A tissue forms, is injured and repairs itself. The library follows the experiments and ideas used to understand those processes.
A question across generations
The collection runs from du Bois-Reymond’s animal electricity and Bose’s observations in plants to contemporary work on voltage patterns and regeneration. The instruments and explanations change, but the relationship between electrical activity and living form remains a recurring question.
For our work on tissue and cellular regulation, that history is useful because it keeps several kinds of evidence in view. An electrical measurement, a molecular change and a repaired structure describe different things. Connecting them requires more than observing that they occur together.
The encyclopedia
Readers can follow a concept across books and papers, or begin with a historical author and trace the questions that followed. The collection provides a wider setting for our Research studies of cellular response and energetics.