Hitzig, Julius Eduard

   (1838–1907)

   The codiscoverer, along with Gustav Theodor Fritsch (1838–1927), of the principle of the electrical excitability of the brain, Hitzig was born in Berlin, into the family of a well-known architect. After gaining his M.D. from Berlin in 1862, he received his Habilitation in internal medicine there in 1872; 3 years later he was called to Zurich as professsor of psychiatry and director of the university psychiatric clinic. In 1879, he went to the University of Halle as professor of psychiatry and director of the Nietleben asylum (Halle received an independent university psychiatric clinic only in 1885, of which Hitzig became head.) He was emerited in 1903 and died in a diabetic coma 4 years later. His best known publication was his epochal discovery of the electrical excitability of the motor cortex of the brain. At the April 5, 1870, meeting of the Berlin Medical Society, he told colleagues that, assisted by Fritsch, he had mapped a good portion of the motor cortex. The historic article was published in the Berlin Clinical Weekly (Berliner Klinische Wochenschrift) in 1870.