Department of Human Anatomy, Histology and Embryology, School of the Basic Medicine, the Fourth Military Medical University: In 2007, the department was combined by the two departments, Department of Human Anatomy and Department of Histology and Embryology. The department was ratified to confer Master's Degree in 1978 and Doctoral Degree in 1981, respectively. The department was assessed as the National Key Discipline in 1989, 2001 and 2007, respectively. And it is one of the disciplines for the post-doctoral program in the basic medicine. In 1995, with the donation of the late Hong Kong banker, Mr K. K. Leung and the approval by the Ministry of Public Health of the General Logistics Department of the PLA, "K. K. Leung Brain Research Centre" was set up. Now there are 5 professors and 7 associate professors, of whom 3 are doctoral supervisors and 4 are master supervisors, 9 lecturers, 6 teaching assistants and 6 technicians in the department.

For a long time, with a variety of resources, the department has developed the systemic researches focusing on the neural mechanisms of analgesia supported by the National Science Fundation for Distinguished Young Scholars, the National High Technology Research and Development Program ("863" Program), the Key Program of National Natural Science Foundation of China and so on.

The new major findings of the department are as the following: the convergence of the somatic and visceral primary afferents from the pelvic organs in the sacral segments of the spinal cord, the central pathways of the proprioception of the trigeminal nerve innervated fields, the fiber connections of the periaqueductal gray (PAG) and regulation of the peripheral noxious inputs by the descending inhibitory system, the pathways of micturition reflex, reproductive biology, and the active substances in the visceral system. With these findings, the department has won one fourth prize in China's State Natural Science Award, three third prizes in the State Technological Invention Award, one first prize in the Chinese Medical Science and Technology Award, two first prizes in the Technological Invention Award of Shaanxi Province, one second prize in the Technological Invention Award of Shaanxi Province, and eight second prizes in the Technological Invention Award of PLA. There are 20-30 publications in the department annually, half of which are published in the international professional journals. In 1985, the department started to set up the "Chinese Journal of Neuroanatomy", which plays an active role in the development of Neuroscience in China.

The research facilities are increasingly improved. Now there are 19 specialized laboratories for: patch clamp recordings, electrophysiology, molecular neurobiology, cell culture, in situ hybridization, immunohistochemitry, tract-tracing, traditional neuroanatomical staining, electron microscopy, light microscopy, image analysis, microphotograhpy, animal surgery and perfusion and housing. All the equipments are worth over 15 million yuan.

So far in the department, 105 post-graduates and 67 PhD candidates have finished their studies, of whom two won the award of "National Excellent Doctoral Dissertation", and 4 students have finished their post-doc training programs on the schedule. Almost all the research staffs have the doctoral degree and oversea research experiences.