Exosomes

Lawrence R. Edelstein, Ph.D. is a neuroscientist and pharmaceutical industry consultant with research interests in multisensory convergence/integration (claustrum) and intercellular communication (exosomes, telocytes). His interest in exosomes was fueled by a theme issue he guest-edited with John Smythies, M.D., F.R.C.P. and Denis Noble, C.B.E., Ph.D., F.R.S. entitled Epigenetic information-processing mechanisms in the brain (2014; https://royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/369/1652). That undertaking proved to be the impetus for a series of peer-reviewed articles in which he and his colleagues theorized as to the whys and wherefores of the multifunctional roles played by seemingly omnipresent and phyla-agnostic exosomes. In addition, Dr. Edelstein is co-editor (along with John Smythies, M.D., F.R.C.P. and Vilayanur Ramachandran, M.B.B.S., Ph.D., Hon. F.R.C.P.) of the book Claustrum - Structural, Functional and Clinical Neuroscience (2014; www.elsevier.com/books/the-claustrum/smythies/978-0-12-404566-8), as well as the founder and editor-in-chief of the open-access journal Claustrum (2016; www.tandfonline.com/toc/zcla20/current).

John Raymond Smythies, M.D., F.R.C.P. (1922-2019) was a pre-eminent neuropsychiatrist and neuroscientist who made significant contributions to both these disciplines. Together with Humphry Osmond he developed the first biochemical theory of schizophrenia - the transmethylation hypothesis. This has recently come back into focus following the finding that DNA methylation is abnormal in schizophrenia. He made extensive contributions to knowledge in a number of fields including the neuropharmacology of psychedelic drugs; the functional neuroanatomy of synapses with particular regard to the role of synaptic plasticity, endocytosis and redox factors; the role in the brain of orthoquinone metabolites of catecholamines; and, in particular, theories of brain-consciousness relations. More recently he developed foundational hypotheses and theories specific to the function of exosomes, telocytes and the claustrum, and on epigenetic processes in information processing in the brain. Professor Smythies served as President of the International Society of Psychoneuroendocrinology from 1970-1974, Consultant to the World Health Organization from 1963-1968, and Editor of the International Review of Neurobiology from 1958-1991. He was elected a member of the Athenaeum in 1968. He published over 240 scientific papers and sixteen books. He held the positions of Professor Emeritus and the Charles Byron Ireland Professor of Psychiatric Research at the University of Alabama Medical Center at Birmingham, Visiting Scholar at the Center for Brain and Cognition, University of California San Diego, and Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Neurology, University College London.

Dr Peter Quesenberry is the Paul Calabresi Professor of Oncology at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. He received his medical degree from the University of Virginia, completed residency at University Hospital and Boston City Hospital in Boston, MA, and completed a Hematology/Oncology Fellowship at St Elizabeth's Hospital/Tufts New England Medical Center. Dr Quesenberry was previously President of the Intwrnational society of Hematology and was editor of the JOurnmal Experimental Hematololgy 1990-1998. He was the leukocyte editor for the Year Book of Hematology from 1987-1998 More recently he is the American Editor for the Journal of Extracellularvesicles.

Denis Noble developed the first mathematical model of cardiac cells in 1960 using his discovery, with his supervisor Otto Hutter, of two of the main cardiac potassium ion channels. These discoveries were published in Nature (1960) and The Journal of Physiology (1962). The work was later developed with Dick Tsien, Dario DiFrancesco, Don Hilgemann and others to become the canonical models on which more than 100 cardiac cell models are based today. All are available on the CellML website. He was elected President of the International Union of Physiological Sciences (IUPS) at its Congress in Kyoto in 2009, and the opening speech is available as a pdf on this page. He was then elected for a second term at the 2013 Congress in Birmingham, UK. He also delivered the opening plenary lecture at the Congress (see Music of Life link) which is also published as an article in Experimental Physiology (2013). He is the author of the first popular book on Systems Biology, The Music of Life, and his most recent lectures concern the implications for evolutionary biology. To follow the debate on this see the FAQ (Answers) pages on the Music of Life website. Denis Noble has published more than 500 papers and 11 books.