Foster, Michael (1836–1907)

English physiologist and founder of the School of Physiology at Cambridge University. Foster published a series of textbooks on physiology (the first was published in 1876), in which he hypothesized widely about the mechanism of nerve impulse transmission and subsequent muscle contraction. He proposed that both electrical and chemical processes could be involved in transmission.

He was particularly interested in the control of the heart beat. Since a frog's heart continued to beat for some time after it was extracted from the animal, Albrecht von Haller had proposed that the cardiac muscle possesses an inherent rhythmical power that acts automatically (the myogenic theory). Foster demonstrated this theory by applying a constant current to the apex of a frog's heart devoid of nerve tissue, producing rhythmical activity.

Foster was born in Huntingdon, UK and graduated in classics from University College London. However, he had always had a keen interest in medicine and decided to study the subject, obtaining his MD in 1859. Following a voyage in 1860 as a ship's surgeon and a short period as a general practitioner, Foster entered academic life as a lecturer in the physiology department at University College London. He went on to found the physiology department at Cambridge and to hold the first chair in physiology 1883–1903.