Adolf Beck: A pioneer in electroencephalography in between Richard Caton and Hans Berger

Adolf Beck, born in 1863 in Kraków (Poland), joined the Department of Physiology of the Jagiellonian University in 1889, to work directly under the prominent professor in physiology Napoleon Cybulski. Following his suggestion, Beck started studies on the electrical brain activity of animals. He recorded negative electrical potentials in several brain areas evoked by peripheral sensory impulses. Using this technique, Beck localised various centres in the brain of several animal species. In doing this, he discovered continuous electrical oscillations in the electrical brain activity and noted that these oscillations ceased after sensory stimulation. This was the first description of desynchronization in electrical brain potentials. He published these findings in 1890 in the German Centralblatt für Physiologie. Immediately, an intense discussion arose under physiologists on the question who could claim being the founder of electroencephalography. Ultimately, Richard Caton from Liverpool showed that he had performed similar experiments in monkeys years earlier. Nevertheless, Beck added several new elements to the nature of electrical brain activity, such as evoked potentials and desynchronization. In looking back, Adolf Beck can be regarded, next to Richard Caton and together with Hans Berger (who later introduced the electrical brain recording method to humans), as one of the founders of electroencephalography.