Why should there be a handbook of sensory physiology, and if so, why now' The editors have asked this question, marshalled all of the arguments that seemed to speak against their project, and then discovered that most of these arguments really spoke in favor of it: there seemed to be no doubt that the attempt should be made and that it should be made now. No complete overview of sensory physiology has been attempted since Bethe's "Handbuch der normalen und pathologischen Physiologie", nearly forty years ago. Since then, the field has evolved with unforeseen rapidity. Although electric probing...

This preface is addressed to the reader who wishes to inquire into the prevailing concepts, hypotheses and theories about development of sensory systems and wants to know how they are exemplified in the following chapters. I believe that science is hypothesis and theory and that the growth and evolution of any branch of science can be measured by the degree to which its theories have been reified. By that standard, one must conc1ude that developmental neuro biologie is in its infancy. The rapid accumulation of observations which has occurred in this branch of science in the past century leads...

This volume was designed to focus on the problems of perception and originally was to have been solely edited by Professor Hans-Lukas Teuber who was a member of the editorial board which initiated production of the Handbook. Accordingly, he issued invitations to a number of researchers III perception asking them to contribute chapters written in a style described III his words: " . . . Ire hope that no author lI'ill feel COl/strained to undertake a major search of the literature: he could In'ite, instead. on an area in which he has been quite actire himse't and II'here most of the issues are...

The waterproof sensory sheet covering the mammalian body has a rich afferent innervation which provides an abundance of complex information for use by the central nervous system often in conjunction with information from receptors in the joints. This book is an attempt to provide a systematic account of the way in which this somatosensory system works. The properties of the peripheral receptors have been debated in scientific terms for about a century and the resolu tion of the conflict in favour of the existence of 'specific' receptors for mechanical, thermal and noxious stimuli is reported...