The folic acid group: The discovery of Methotrexate and some of the other antimetabolic agents that are currently being used for the treatment of neoplastic disease is a long and colorful epic, beginning about thirty years ago. The development of these “folic acid analogs” was intimately tied in with the elucidation of one of the B complex vitamins, folic acid. Folic acid (pteroylglutamic acid) is found in many natural materials.

The question of prematurity and its role in the development of spasticity is investigated in this study. 319 spastic quadriplegic and 112 spastic paraplegic children from The Montreal Children's Hospital were selected as probands. The incidence of prematurity in this group was 33.8 per cent. [...]

The development of the knowledge of the thalamus has proceeded along many avenues of research. The early workers ranged far and wide, comparing, dividing, and subdividing the thalamus and in general terms catalogued anatomical data. Later the relationship of the thalamus and other areas of the nervous system was discovered and with this began the studies of the thalamocortical and corticothalamic connections. [...]

It is not difficult to conceive of physiological conditions in mammalian life requiring an immediate and generalized augmentation of neuro-muscular activity, with or without an accompanying increase in mental activity. Fear, excitement, pain, and rage, are all examples of situations which cause unusual emphasis to be placed on the ability of the individual to develop a rapid and widespread increase in all muscular forces. [...]

The present investigation was undertaken to examine in man the reactions of the cells within the supraoptic and paraventricular nuclei to stalk section and hypophysectomy. Although there are a number of reports of similar studies in a variety of experimental animals, information on the effects in man is scanty. [...]

Experimental demyelination in animals, as is well known, may be produced by a variety of methods. It is unlikely that most of the factors responsible for experimental demyelination are in any way related to those responsible for the commonly recognized clinical demyelinative diseases. However, the pathological picture produced by the use of one of these experimental methods, namely, Experimental Allergic Encephalomyelitis, is very similar to that produced by some forms of human demyelinating diseases. [...]

This work began as a clinical analysis of patients who suffered unexplained hemipareses following temporal lobectomies. A preliminary survey suggested that the site of disturbance was the internal capsule and that the cause was vascular interference. Further study confirmed this impression and produced strong clinical evidence that the disability was caused by spasm of the capsular arteries in response to mechanical irritation. [...]

The following conclusions may be drawn from electrophysiological study of the efferent pathways of the supplementary and precentral motor areas: 1) Stimulation of the motor cortex by single, short duration square pulses evokes in the cord responses consisting of a stable "direct" early component of fixed latency and of an "indirect" late one, variable in amplitude form and latency. 2) Both components are electrically positive at the recording electrode tip against a diffuse reference. [...]

This work is a biochemical study of human brain tumours involving a comparison of various metabolic activities of one tumour type with another and with normal brain. It was hoped that, besides obtaining information about brain tumours, some idea might be obtained of the contribution of non-neuronal elements to the total metabolism of brain.

Epileptiform EEG discharges consisting of alternate waves and spikes at a frequency of 3 seconds and occurring synchronously in both cerebral hemispheres are classically associated with the clinical condition of petit mal. No focal pathological lesion has as yet been demonstrated to account for this form of human epilepsy. Some clinical and EEG observations as well as the animal experiments by Jasper and Droogleever-Fortuyn (1947), Ingvar (1955), and Perot (1961) suggest that this type of epileptic discharge may originate in a mesencephalo-diencephalic system with diffuse bilateral projection pathways often referred to as the "centrencephalic system" (Penfïeld, 1950; Penfield and Jasper, 1954).