Elias von Cyon, also known as Elie de Cyon, born Ilya Fadeyevich Tsion (Russian- Илья Фаддеевич Цион); (March 25, 1843 – 1912) was a Russian-French physiologist born in Telšiai

Telšiai

Telšiai , is a city in Lithuania with about 35,000 inhabitants. It is the capital of Telšiai County and Samogitia region, and it is located on Lake Mastis.-Names:...

, Russian Empire (today Lithuania).

He studied medicine at the medical-surgical academy in Warsaw

Warsaw

Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...

, at the University of Kiev and in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

. In 1866 he worked in Leipzig

Leipzig

Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

 as an assistant to Carl Ludwig

Carl Ludwig

----Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig was a German physician and physiologist.In 1842 Ludwig became a professor of physiology and in 1846 of comparative anatomy...

 (1816–1895), with whom he collaborated on creation of the first isolated perfused

Perfusion

In physiology, perfusion is the process of nutritive delivery of arterial blood to a capillary bed in the biological tissue. The word is derived from the French verb "perfuser" meaning to "pour over or through."...

 frog heart preparation.

From 1867 he taught classes on anatomy

Anatomy

Anatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...

 and physiology at the University of St. Petersburg, where he was director of the physiology laboratory. At St. Petersburg one of his students was Ivan Pavlov

Ivan Pavlov

Ivan Petrovich Pavlov was a famous Russian physiologist. Although he made significant contributions to psychology, he was not in fact a psychologist himself but was a mathematician and actually had strong distaste for the field....

 (1849–1936). In 1870 he became an associate professor, and following student protests concerning his political views, he relocated to Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 in 1877. In Paris he attained French citizenship and worked with famed physiologist Claude Bernard

Claude Bernard

Claude Bernard was a French physiologist. He was the first to define the term milieu intérieur . Historian of science I. Bernard Cohen of Harvard University called Bernard "one of the greatest of all men of science"...

 (1813–1881).

His name is associated with "Cyon's nerve" (aortic nerve), which is a branch of the vagus nerve

Vagus nerve

The vagus nerve , also called pneumogastric nerve or cranial nerve X, is the tenth of twelve paired cranial nerves...

 which terminates in the aortic arch

Aortic arch

The arch of the aorta or the transverse aortic arch is the part of the aorta that begins at the level of the upper border of the second sternocostal articulation of the right side, and runs at first upward, backward, and to the left in front of the trachea; it is then directed backward on the left...

 and base of the heart. It is composed entirely of afferent fibers.