In 1860 Santiago Ramón y Cajal undertook an artistic calling to which he would be constantly devoted. His father, who was a GP, put him on a stable career path: working on the railways. However, he ended up studying medicine in spite of the financial difficulties facing his family. He graduated in 1873 and joined the Military Medical Corps in Lleida. He was posted to Cuba where he fell ill with malaria and dysentery. His health problems would burden him for many years to come. He made his way in the field of medical research in the Spanish university community.
He began his second period of residence in Catalonia in 1887 as a professor of normal and pathological histology at the University of Barcelona. In 1888, he established the nerve cell as the basic unit of nervous structure. This research line earned him widespread international renown. In 1893 he was made Honorary Doctor of Medicine of the University of Cambridge and in 1906 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine.