In the course of his experiments on irritable responses caused by static electricity applied to frog muscles, Galvani produced electric current from the contact of two different metals in a moist environment. Galvani mistakenly believed this phenomenon (which his nephew Giovanni Aldini called “galvanism”) to be animal electricity. See No. 594.1 Facsimile of Volta’s copy, with English translation, and bibliography of editions and translations by J.F. Fulton and M.E. Stanton, Norwalk, Conn., Bumdy Library, 1953.

The first account of Galvani’s electrical experiments without the presence of metals, in which he demonstrated the presence of electrical energy in living tissue by showing that convulsions in frog nerve-muscle preparations could be produced simply by touching nerve to muscle. This observation of the injury current of nerve or demarcation current was the first proof of animal electricity. The key experiment appears in a 23-page “Supplemento” following p. 168. Some authorities consider this a joint publication of Galvani and Aldini. See No. 593.