Historical perspectives in cell physiology: looking back to help the discipline move forward.

THE SPANISH PHILOSOPHER AND ESSAYIST, George Santayana (1863– 1952), noted that “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” That idea has led the Editors of American Journal of Physiology-Cell Physiology to initiate a new type of article, “Historical Perspectives.” Several of the Associate Editors (among others) and I, especially those of us of a “certain age,” have been surprised to discover that many of today’s students, postdoctoral trainees—and even faculty— have a limited sense of key past discoveries (i.e., “the history”) that underlie major current concepts in the biomedical sciences. We find that this lack of historical perspective is especially true in cell physiology, even though it is a relatively young (sub-)discipline in biology. I have recently observed that courses, meetings, seminar speakers, and even review articles often fail to adequately discuss what some might consider “classic” experiments, studies, or data–i.e., the type so nicely discussed in this issue by Rick Welch and Jim Clegg related to protoplasm. Such retrospective analyses are particularly valuable in helping readers, especially those who are initiating work in a scientific area, understand how new ideas are developed, tested, and ultimately validated. As importantly, by understanding how investigators overcame impediments to advance knowledge in a field, readers can be informed and, we hope, inspired—a notion invoked by peer reviewers of the article by Welch and Clegg. I thus invite readers who have an interest in these types of articles to contact one of the associate editors or me to propose topics for additional Historical Perspectives and in addition, and as importantly, to propose authors who can provide useful insights, such as those in the Historical Perspective by Welch and Clegg. Several of the Associate Editors have identified potential topics and suggested authors for such articles, but we look forward to obtaining suggestions from our readers for what may become a regular, and I hope valued, part of American Journal of Physiology-Cell Physiology.