the.com/neurotransmission
Chemical gossip between neurons, millions of times a second, deciding who you are
means The process by which a nerve cell releases chemical messengers across a synapse to trigger, dampen, or modulate a signal in the next cell.
from Built from Greek 'neuron' (sinew, nerve) and Latin 'trans' (across) plus 'mittere' (to send) — the same 'mittere' behind 'transmit,' 'mission,' and 'missile.' The word itself is a 20th-century scientific compound, assembled once researchers like Otto Loewi confirmed in the 1920s that nerve signals cross the gap between cells chemically, not as a continuous spark — so the term literally just means 'sending across nerves,' coined to name a mechanism once it was finally caught in the act.
- speed
- some signals travel over 100 meters per second
- gap
- crosses a synapse smaller than a virus
- timing
- takes about one millisecond per handoff
- chemistry
- serotonin and dopamine are just salesmen, not moods