Introducción

The progress achieved by early 19^th century microscopists, led to the foundations of cell theory. It grew strong and coherent by the effort of plant and animal histologists such as Matthias Schleiden and Theodor Schwan in the 1830’s; roads were paved for the comprehension that the cell, plant or animal (nucleated for all purposes) was the fundamental, morphological and physiological unit of living beings, so every organism was either composed of one cell or many (Coleman, 1985). In the early days, cell theory was opened to many interpretations; in fact, the original proposal had left room to the spontaneous generation of microorganisms (Coleman, 1965). But in time, the adherence and support in the 1850’s of Louis Pasteur and several other neglected other early alternative perspectives of cell theory, specially spontaneous generation. 

Two rival theories to the hardened cell theory, that accounted for the origin of the cell, were generated. One, was that based on intimate symbiosis of cell individuals  belonging to distinct taxonomical groups raised for explaining the possibility that eukaryotic cell components (Sapp, 1994). The other, was the belief that protoplasm, both cytoplasm and nucleoplasm, beared fully in itself, the distinctive qualities of life.

In the early 20th century, the Mexican Alfonso Luis Herrera was the champion of protoplasmic research, a discipline which led him directly to develop a scientific theory on the origin of life. The first of all times.

Sobre los Autores   

Ulises Iturbe. Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Hidalgo

Juli Peretó. Universitat de Valencia

Antonio Lazcano. Universidad Nacional autónoma de México