Richard Alan North FRS (born 20 May 1944) is a British biomedical scientist, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Manchester.
North grew up in Halifax, West Yorkshire and attended Heath Grammar School, before studying at University of Aberdeen.
As a PhD student, he discovered the two main classes of neuron in the enteric nervous system[1] and described new type of slow synaptic connection.
[2] As a professor at Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine (1975–1981), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology(1981–1986), and the Vollum Institute, Oregon Heath Sciences University (1987–1993), he showed that opiates, as well as several other amine and peptide neurotransmitters, inhibit the activity of neurons by opening potassium-selective ion channels in the cell membrane.
[3][4] This required the development of a method to record electrical activity from single neurons maintained alive in thin brain slices.