A Selected Chronological Bibliography of Biology and Medicine
Part 3B
1903—1924
Compiled by James Southworth
Steen, Ph.D.
Delta State University
Dedicated to my loving family
This document celebrates those secondary authors and laboratory technicians
without whom most of this great labor of discovery would have proved
impossible.
Please forward any editorial comments to: James S. Steen, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, DSU Box 3262, Cleveland, MS 38733. jsteen08@bellsouth.net
1903
"The supreme qualities of all
science are honesty, reliability, and sober, healthy criticism." Niels Ryberg Finsen (871).
Antoine Henri Becquerel (FR) in recognition of the extraordinary
services he had rendered by his discovery of spontaneous radioactivity and
Pierre Curie (FR) and Marie Sklodowska Curie (PL-FR) in recognition of the
extraordinary services they have rendered by their joint researches on the
radiation phenomena discovered by Professor Henri Becquerel were awarded the
Nobel Prize in Physics.
Svante August Arrhenius (SE) was awarded the Nobel Prize in
Chemistry for his doctoral dissertation work in which he hypothesized ionic
dissociation.
Niels Ryberg Finsen (DK) was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology
or Medicine "in recognition of his contribution to the treatment of
diseases, especially lupus vulgaris,
with concentrated light radiation, whereby he has opened a new avenue for
medical science."
Carl Alexander Neuberg (DE-US) used the term biochemistry,
defining it as science concerned with the chemical basis of life. Ref
Carl Alexander Neuberg (DE-US) introduced the term phosphorylation
in 1910. Ref
Thomas Purdie (GB) and James Colquhoun Irvine (GB) introduced an
important methodology for the analysis of carbohydrate structure. Free hydroxyl
groups were methylated followed by acid hydrolysis. The nature of the resulting
monosaccharides could then be determined (1760).
Henry Lord Wheeler (US) and Treat Baldwin Johnson (US) synthesized
cytosine (2335).
Felix Ehrlich (DE) isolated the amino acid isoleucine from
nitrogenous substances in beet-sugar molasses (644).
Hermann Emil Fischer (DE) and Joseph von Mering (DE) were the
first to synthesize a therapeutically active "barbiturate" by
substituting two ethyl groups for two hydrogens attached to carbon in barbituric
acid; the result was diethyl barbituric acid or diethylmalonylurea. It is
frequently called (barbital or veronal). When they administered this new
barbiturate to human subjects, the compound was found to induce sleep (750; 751). The term for a drug that causes
sleep induction is a somnolent or a hypnotic.
Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf Baeyer (DE), in 1864, had
synthesized barbiturhaltige säure (malonylurea) from a reaction of urea with malonic acid, a
chemical found in apples. Malonylurea became known as barbituric acid, parent
compound of well-known sleeping pills
of today (92). Later it was he who synthesized the
dye indigo.
Heinrich Hörlein (DE), in 1911, at F. Bayer & Co. synthesized
phenobarbital (Luminal). It has excellent hypnotic action and anticonvulsant
activity. It was patented by F. Bayer & Co. under DE 247952.
Alfred Hauptmann (DE) discovered the antiepileptic properties of Luminal (phenobarbital) by
accident when studying the anxiolytic effects of various drugs (810; 979).
Manipulations of the side chain at position 5 have resulted in
amobarbital (Amytal) in 1923, pentobarbital (Nembutal) in 1930, and
secobarbital (Seconal) in 1930. These drugs have become widely known as drugs
of abuse. Changes in position 2 have resulted in the short-acting barbiturates:
hexobarbital (Evipal), thiopental (Pentothal) and methohexital (Brevital). Valium and Halcion are also
barbiturates. Sodium pentothal has been called the “truth serum” because it
gives its recipient a good feeling when being forthright.
Samuel Rideal (GB) and J.T.
Ainslie Walker (GB) developed the original method for determining the
phenol coefficient (1810).
The Hygienic Laboratory
Method (1921)
is
a modification
of
the Rideal-Walker
Method (1).
The Food and Drug Administration Test (1931) is a combination of the best features of
both above.
Theobald Smith (US), in 1903, noted that guinea pigs
used for diphtheria anti-toxin
testings frequently succumbed rapidly to a second injection of diphtheria, i.e., anaphylaxis. This
phenomenon was not reported by Smith but communicated by him to Paul Ehrlich (1697).
Nicolas Maurice Arthus (FR) described a type of allergic reaction
brought on by repeated injection of horse serum into rabbits. The reaction was
characterized by a localized, acute necrotizing vasculitis. Later it became
known as the Arthus reaction (62).
Charles G. Cochrane (US), William O. Weigle (US), and Frank James
Dixon (US) showed that this reaction is caused by the formation of relatively
large amounts of antigen-antibody precipitates in the vessel walls. They found
that polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMNs) phagocytize and rapidly degrade
antigen-antibody complexes but are themselves largely responsible for the
inflammation and necrosis (432).
Carl Oluf Jensen (DK) was the first to do experiments in transplantation immunity. He found that
tumors, which arose spontaneously in mice, could sometimes be propagated by
grafting them from one mouse to another. He passed one tumor through nineteen
generations of grafting. Jensen recognized that mice of different races were not all equally susceptible
to the growth of the tumors and spoke of an active
immunity. This report discredited the theory of the infectivity of cancer (1132).
Georg Schöne (DE) coined the phrase transplantation immunity to distinguish it from reactions
resulting from injections of foreign materials (1943; 1944).
Nicholas Senn (CH-US) was the
first to use röntgen rays to treat leukemia (1953).
Theobald Smith (US) and Arthur L. Reagh (US) noted that there are
two types of antigens present in the
Salmonella group, one associated with the cell substance and the other with
the flagella (1989).
Edmund Weil (AT) and Arthur Felix (PL-GB) would designate these as
the O and H antigens respectively (2314; 2315).
Louis Lapicque (FR) introduced several terms to describe
excitability of nerve and muscle. Rheobase
(lowest point of current) was defined as, “the intensity of a constant current
of abrupt onset and prolonged duration which gives the threshold of
excitability.” Chronaxie (value of
time) was defined as, “the duration of constant current of abrupt onset which
attains the threshold of stimulation with an intensity equal to double that of
the rheobase, i.e., with a voltage of
double that of the rheobase” (1299). This work was begun in 1903.
Ross Granville Harrison (US) discovered the mode of embryonic
origin of the lateral line sense organs of aquatic vertebrates. He demonstrated that the growth cones of
sensory neurites accompany the primordium, thereby, establishing a physical
link between the cranial ganglion and the body neuromasts (962).
Almroth Edward Wright (GB) and Stewart R. Douglas (GB) showed that
substances exist in immune serum, which by their action render the microbe more
susceptible to phagocytosis. They called these substances opsonins (Greek, I prepare victuals for) (2430; 2431). Today we know that opsonins are
antibodies.
Dmitrii Iosifovich Ivanowski; Dmitrii Iosifovich Iwanowsky;
Dmitrii Iosifovich Ivanovski (RU) described inclusion bodies caused by tobacco
mosaic virus in tobacco plants (1109).
Paul Ambroise Remlinger (FR), Riffat Bey Frasheri (AL), and their
assistant Hamdi Efendi (TR) mixed a fixed rabies virus homogenate with a rather
virulent culture of the fowl cholera agent (Pasteurella multocida), put
the mixture through a Berkefeld V Filter and this mixture was then inoculated
intracerebrally in rabbits. While the absence of Pasteurella among the
inoculated animals confirmed the success of filtration, their death from rabies
after displaying paralysis symptoms within 8-10 days made clear that the rabies
agent could pass the Berkefeld V Filter. Remlinger went on to repeat the same
experiment by using both fixed and street viruses and filtrating the agent
through less and less permeable Berkefeld and Chamberland filters and was thus
able to demonstrate that the rabies virus could pass through the porcelain
filters. He therefore not
only confirmed Pasteur’s hypothesis that the rabies agent was a filterable
virus, but at the same time demonstrated that it was not a parasitic protozoan
as some had suggested (1786; 1787). Note: the first rhabdovirus
Amédée Borrel (FR) discovered the sheep pox and goat pox virus (249). Note: One virus is thought to
cause both.
Adelchi Negri (IT) described the characteristic inclusion bodies
found in the brain cells of animals infected with rabies. They are found most
frequently in the pyramidal cells of Ammon's horn, and the Purkinje cells of
the cerebellum. He mistakenly thought them to be protozoa (1611-1614). These inclusion bodies were later
found to be rabies viruses and named Negri bodies in his honor.
Amédée Borrel (FR) proposed the virus theory of cancer (248).
Vilhelm Ellermann (DK) and Oluf Bang (DK) showed that by injecting
bacteria-free tissue filtrates from infected chickens into healthy chickens
they could transmit leukemia in chickens. This implied a viral origin of the
leukemia, i.e., oncogenic viruses (659; 660; 1964). Note: the first leukemia
virus
Francis Peyton Rous (US) demonstrated that an agent, which passed
through filters that stopped bacteria, caused a spindle-cell sarcoma in
Plymouth Rock chickens. Rous was reluctant to pronounce it a virus. Today this
virus is called the Rous sarcoma virus and was one of the first of the tumor viruses to be demonstrated (1848-1852). Note: first solid tumor virus
Francisco Duran-Reynals (ES-US) proved that the Rous sarcoma - the
cell-destroying virus of chicken cancer - was not confined to chickens but
could leap the so-called species barrier and incite cancers in ducks and
turkeys. Indeed, the virus sometimes gained virulence as it passed from one
species to another. He showed how a virus could lie dormant for many years
before inciting cancer (626; 627).
Hugo Schottmüller (DE) was the first to use blood agar for determining
hemolytic properties of bacteria. He proposed that different varieties of
streptococci be classified based on their capacities to hemolyze erythrocytes (1945).
W.K. Stefansky (RU) and George A. Dean (GB) discovered Mycobacterium lepraemurium, the
etiological agent of rat leprosy (555; 2033).
John Fleetezelle Anderson (US) described Rocky Mountain spotted fever as a new disease and suggested the
wood tick as a possible carrier (48).
Louis B. Wilson (US) and William M. Chowning (US) discussed
history, location, season, previous conditions of the patient, sex and age,
types of disease, symptoms, prognosis, morbid anatomy, morbid histology,
etiology, inoculation experiments, mode of infection, possible hosts,
diagnosis, preventive measures, and treatment as they applied to pyroplasmosis
hominis ("spotted fever"
or "tick fever" of the
Rocky Mountains) (2395).
Howard Taylor Ricketts (US) demonstrated tick transmission of Rocky Mountain spotted fever to guinea
pigs. He found that the etiologic agent is present in blood from infected
humans and demonstrated that it can be removed via filtration (1805; 1806).
Howard Taylor Ricketts (US) demonstrated that a bipolar-staining
bacillus of minute size and transmitted by the bite of the wood tick (Dermacentor occidentalis) is the
causative agent of Rocky Mountain spotted
fever (1807). This bacterium would later be called Rickettsia rickettsia in his honor and Simeon Burt Wolbach (US)
would offer final proof that Rickettsia
rickettsia is the etiological agent (2420).
Frederick George Novy (US) and Ward J. McNeal (US) took blood from
rats and succeeded in cultivating the trypanosome of rats, Trypanosoma lewisi, on blood agar (1664).
William Ernest Castle (US) wrote the first paper on Mendelism in
America (363).
William Ernest Castle (US) was probably the first to recognize the
relationship between allele and genotype frequencies (362). Note: In this work Castle anticipated what has now become
known as the Hardy–Weinberg law. Formulated in the terms "as
soon as selection is arrested the race remains stable at the degree of purity
then attained."
Felix Mendel (DE) described his method for intracutaneous testing
for tuberculin sensitivity. Within 24 to 72 hours the injected area becomes
hard (indurated) and red in a person who is infected with tuberculosis or has
been immunized with BCG vaccine (1491; 1492).
Clemens Peter Pirquet von Cesenatico; Clemens Peter von Pirquet
(AT) used tuberculin in a diagnostic skin scratch test and Charles Montoux (FR)
used it to perform an intradermal test (1424; 2250-2252).
Charles Mantoux (FR) popularized Mendel’s test, thus the
Mendel-Mantoux Tuberculin Test (1424).
Nicholas Senn (US) was the first to use röntgen rays to treat
leukemia (1953).
Alfred Walter Campbell (AU-GB) successfully studied the
cytoarchitecture of the anthropoid cerebral cortex with the aim of establishing
a correlation between physiologic function and histologic structure (333).
Wilhelm Ludwig Johannsen (DK) demonstrated in plants that natural
selection could only influence evolutionary change if there is a source
containing multiple genotypes. Therefore, genetically pure lines (homozygous)
would not lend themselves to natural selection (1137; 1138; 1733). He introduced the terms and defined the concepts of gene,
phenotype, genotype, and selection (1139; 1140).
Richard Woltereck (DE) would confirm this restriction on natural
selection as it applies to animals using parthenogenic freshwater crustaceans
of the genus Daphnia (2427).
Emily Arensen (NO) presented information on the geographical
distribution of sponges (59).
Ludwig Edinger (DE), Adolf Wallenberg
(DE), Gordon Morgan Holmes (GB), Grafton Elliot-Smith (AU-GB), John B. Johnston
(US), Cornelius Ubbo Ariëns-Kappers
(NL), Gotthelf Carl Huber (US), and Elizabeth Caroline Crosby (US) established
the anatomy of the avian brain. They suggested that the major subdivisions of
the avian telencephalon correspond to different components of the mammalian
basal ganglia with the avian spinal cord, midbrain, and thalamus being
homologous to those of mammals, but that nearly all of the avian telencephalon
corresponds to mammalian basal ganglia (57; 638; 639; 662; 663; 1144).
Pietro Grocco (IT) and Karl Andreyevich Rauchfuss (RU) described the triangular area of
dullness (Grocco’s triangle or Grocco-Rauchfuss
triangle) on the
patient’s back, on the side opposite to that on which a pleural effusion had occurred. Most commonly seen in children and adolescents (899; 1777).
Adam Rydel (PL-DE) and Friedrich Wilhelm Seiffer (DE) found that
vibratory sense and proprioceptive sense are closely related and that both
senses are carried in the posterior columns of the spinal cord (1878).
Pierre Marie Félix Janet (FR) and Fulgence Raymond (FR) described psychasthenia for the first time (a
neurosis marked by stages of pathologic fear or anxiety, obsessions, fixed
ideas, tics, feelings of inadequacy, and self-accusation), i.e., obsessive
compulsive disorder. Here bulimia is
described in medical terms for the first time (1127).
Ettore Marchiafava (IT) and Amico Bignami (IT) described a
neurological disorder consisting of tremor, convulsions, and coma related to
alcohol intake (1429; 1430). This is a progressive neurological
disease of alcoholism, characterized by corpus callosum demyelination,
necrosis, and subsequent atrophy.
William Gibson Spiller (US), John Herr Musser (US), and Edward
Martin (US) described inflammation of the spinal canal (arachnoiditis) in a
patient as meningitis circumscripta
spinalis (2016).
Georges Fernand Isidore Widal (FR) found that blood in
cerebrospinal fluid was diagnostic of meningeal hemorrhage (2348).
Georges Froin (FR) described inflammation of the meninges with
obstruction of the spinal subarachnoid space associated with a coagulable state
of the cerebrospinal fluid (Froin syndrome) (807). Note:
This condition is typically caused by meningeal irritation (e.g. during spinal
meningitis) and CSF flow blockage by tumor mass or abscess.
William Osler (CA) was the first to associate a renal affection or
one affecting the central nervous system with cases of lupus erythematosus (1687; 1688).
Alfred Wolff-Eisner (DE) trephined the tibia and femur of
experimental animals and suggested biopsy of bone marrow as a clinical
procedure (2424).
Oscar Thorvald Bloch (DE) and Jan Mikulicz-Radecki; Johannes von
Mikulicz-Radecki (PL-AT)
developed a two-stage operation for resection of tumors of the rectum. This
operation is known as the Bloch-Mikulicz
operation (2248).
Maximilian Carl-Friedrich Nitze
(DE) developed a ureteral occlusion catheter to block the ureter of the
diseased kidney so that the urine of the healthy kidney could be collected
separately (1654).
Karl Otto Ringleb (DE) improved the
cystoscope with his “orienting cystoscope,” a breakthrough in 1908 (1815; 1816).
Suprapubic prostatectomy had a mortality rate of 50% prior to the introduction
of Ringleb-Berlin’s new method, after which the rate went down to 10%.
Edwin Beer (US) devised a new method for surgical treatment of
bladder tumors employing
high frequency (Oudin) currents through a catheterizing cystoscope (175).
Leo Buerger (US) constructed a
universal urethroscope with two optical systems, direct or indirect viewing,
and used for catheterizing and operating respectively. It was both a cystoscope
and urethroscope (316).
Maximilian Stern (DE-US), with
Reinhold Wappler’s assistance, created the first instrument that used an
electric loop to cut prostatic tissue (2041).
S.W. Goldberg (RU) and Efim
Semenovich London (RU) described the use of radium to treat two patients with basal cell carcinoma of the skin. The
disease was eradicated in both patients (849).
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov; Ivan Petrovic Pavlov (RU) reported in 1901
how he used salivary gland fistulas in dogs to demonstrate two types of
reflexes—one inherited, the other developed from specific or psychic stimuli by
training and association. The discovery of the second type, the conditioned reflex had a dramatic effect
on the fields of physiology and psychology (1719-1722).
Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov (RU) wrote Reflexes of the Brain, which Pavlov acknowledged as the single most
important theoretical inspiration for his work on conditioning (1723; 1947-1949).
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov; Ivan Petrovic Pavlov (RU) and Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev; Vladimir
Mikhailovich Bechterev (RU) independently developed a theory of conditioned reflexes which describes
automatic responses to the environment. What Bekhterev called association reflex is called the conditioned reflex by Pavlov, although
the two theories are essentially the same. John Watson discovered the
salivation research completed by Pavlov and incorporated it into his famous theory of behaviorism, making Pavlov a
household name. While Watson used Pavlov’s research to support his behaviorist
claims, closer inspection shows that in fact, Watson’s teachings are better
supported by Bekhterev’s research (183).
William Osler (CA) was the first to recognize polycythemia vera as a definite clinical entity (1686).
August Karl Gustav Bier (DE) introduced artificial active and passive hyperemia as an adjuvant to surgical
therapy (208).
Die Neue Generation was founded.
1904
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov; Ivan Petrovic Pavlov (RU) received the
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "in recognition of his work on the
physiology of digestion, through which knowledge on vital aspects of the
subject has been transformed and enlarged."
Thomas Chrowder Chamberlin (US) and Forest Ray Moulton (US)
developed the planetesimal hypothesis for the origin of the Earth and other
planetary bodies, i.e., the planets formed from the coalescing of rocky
fragments ranging in size from boulders to asteroids called planetesimals (377; 1573).
Hantaro Nagaoka (JP), in 1904,
proposed an atomic model with electrons rotating in rings about a central
nucleus. “The system, which I am going to discuss, consists of a large number
of particles of equal mass arranged in a circle at equal angular intervals and
repelling each other with forces inversely, proportional to the square of
distance. At the center of the circle, place a particle of large mass
attracting the other particles according to the same law of force. If these
repelling particles be revolving with nearly the same velocity about the
attracting center, the system will generally remain stable, for small
disturbances provided the attracting force be sufficiently great” (1606).
Ernest Rutherford (New Zealand-GB) proposed the theory of the
nuclear atom. He maintained that the atom contains a very tiny nucleus at its
center which is positively charged, and which contains all the protons of the
atom and therefore nearly all of its mass. In the outer reaches of the atom are
the negatively charged electrons which are very light, and which interpose no
detectable barrier to the passage of alpha particles. This theory was deduced
from experiments where gold foil was bombarded with alpha particles and their
behavior observed (1868).
August Karl Johann Valentin Köhler (DE) and Moritz von Rohr
(PL-DE) developed quartz monochromatic microscope objectives (quartz-fluorite)
for working in the ultraviolet at 275 and 280 nm and designed the first
ultraviolet microscope (1236; 1237). They found that cell nuclei absorb
ultraviolet light strongly.
Friedrich Stolz (DE) and Henry Drysdale Dakin (US) determined the
chemical formula for both epinephrine (adrenaline) and norepinephrine
(noradrenaline) and achieved a total chemical synthesis of both substances (516; 2055). Note: This was the first
synthetic production of a hormone.
Albert Einhorn (DE) synthesized and patented procaine
hydrochloride (Novocaine) in 1904.
Heinrich Braun (DE) was the first to report its existence as Novocaine (273). It supplanted cocaine as the local anesthetic of choice.
Potassium cyanide powder was advocated for the control of ants (1954).
Marshall Albert Barber (US) invented
the technique for making glass capillary micropipettes and manipulating them in
the field of a compound microscope (120; 2097). He developed this method initially to clone bacteria and to
confirm the germ theory of Koch and Pasteur. Later, he refined his approach and
was able to manipulate nuclei in protozoa and to implant bacteria into plant
cells. Continuous improvement and adaptation of this method to new applications
dramatically changed experimental embryology and cytology and led to the
formation of several new scientific disciplines including animal cloning as one
of its latest applications.
Joseph Everett Dutton (GB) and John Lancelot Todd (CA) working in
the Congo and independently Philip Hedorland Ross (GB) and Arthur Dawson Milne
(GB) working in Uganda discovered that human
tick disease is caused by a spirochete (Borrelia
duttonii) transmitted by the African soft-shelled or argasid tick, Orhithodoros moubata (631-633; 1845).
Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch (DE), in 1904, confirmed the role of Orhithodoros moubata and was the first
to demonstrate that spirochetes are transmitted via eggs (transovarial
transmission) to the progeny of the infected female ticks (1227; 1228).
Henri Vallé (FR) and Henri Carré (FR) proved the viral etiology of
equine infectious anemia (2160). Note: the first retrovirus
Thomas Renton Elliott (GB) was the first to express the idea of chemical
neurotransmission, but he did not support it experimentally. “Adrenalin
(epinephrine) might then be the chemical stimulant liberated on each occasion
when the impulse arrives at the periphery” (664; 665). This was one of the earliest
statements of the neurotransmitter hypothesis. More years later von Euler
showed that noradrenaline is the principal neurotransmitter in the
post-ganglionic sympathetic nerves. See,
von Euler 1933a, 1946, and 1948.
Henry Edward Crampton (US), a graduate student in Edmund Beecher
Wilson’s laboratory, performed an experiment, which suggested that there is an
association between a region of egg cytoplasm and a particular type of
development. He removed the polar lobe from cleaving eggs of the mollusk Dentalium and found that larvae showed a
deficiency for the post-trochal and other regions. This effect was not seen
when other regions of equivalent size were removed (2386).
Thomas Hunt Morgan (US) was the first to formulate the concept of
cytoplasmic determination (1560).
Karl Illmensee (US) and Anthony P. Mahowald (US) clearly
established this relationship when they were able to transform animal pole
cells of a Drosophila embryo into
gametes by transferring polar cytoplasm from the posterior to the anterior end
of an egg (1098).
Lorenz Hiltner (DE) introduced the concept of the rhizosphere (1040).
Cornelius Johan Koning (NL) suggested that fungi play an important
role in the decomposition of organic matter and the formation of humus (1242).
Albrecht Karl Ludwig Martin Leonard Kossel (DE) and Henry Drysdale
Dakin (US) discovered the enzyme arginase,
which splits arginine into ornithine and urea (1249; 1250).
Antonino Clementi (IT) found that arginase is absent from the livers of animals, which do not excrete
urea (e.g., birds and reptiles) (407).
George Henry Falkiner Nuttall (US-GB) investigated the serological
relationships of animals by the precipitin reaction (1665).
Franz Schardinger (AT) isolated aerobic bacteria capable of
producing industrial chemicals such as acetone, ethanol, and acetic acid (1898).
Karl Pearson (GB) correctly generalized the principle of
segregation showing that the F2 ratio ¼
AA: ½ Aa: ¼ aa should maintain itself indefinitely in a large, random-breeding
population. This was an explicit statement of the equilibrium principle for a
single locus, and its application to multiple loci could have been inferred from
this (1725). Note: this work
precedes that of Hardy and Weinberg in 1908.
Roland H. Biffen (GB) reported the first proof that disease
resistance in plants may be inherited in a Mendelian manner when he found that
resistance to yellow rust in wheat is inherited as a simple Mendelian recessive
to susceptibility (209).
Carl Franz Joseph Erich Correns (DE) had previously found that in
the four o’clock plant, Mirabilis jalapa,
a gene determined a localized disease in the palisade cells called Sordago (458; 459).
Theodor Boveri (DE) predicted what later became known as genetic linkage: “When in continued
breeding experiments two characters either always appear together, or disappear
together, the conclusion may be drawn with the greatest probability that the
factors for the two characters are located on the same chromosome.” He also
predicted that if in continued breeding experiments combinations in which
traits appear is larger than the number of possible combinations, this might be
the result “of an exchange of parts between homologous chromosomes” (254). See, Sutton, 1903.
Martinus Willem Beijerinck (NL) was the first to obtain the
sulfur-oxidizing bacterium, Thiobacillus
denitrificans in axenic culture (177). Under anaerobic conditions it uses carbon dioxide as a source of
carbon.
Albert Francis Blakeslee (US) analyzed mating type determination
in the fungus Mucor and found that
mating (conjugation) occurs between mycelia of opposite mating types,
designated plus (+) and minus (-). The resulting sporangia produce either + or
- spores, never both (222).
Hans Burgeff (DE) demonstrated that dissimilar nuclei could be
associated in the vegetative hyphae of Phycomyces
nitens, a condition he called heterokaryosis
(318; 319).
Karl Johannes Kniep; Hans Kniep (DE) developed a technique called
tetrad analysis. It is commonly used in fungal genetics (1214).
Mathilde Bensaude (FR) discovered that the clamp connection
structure in the basidiomycetes is used to ensure the production of cells, each
of which contains two complementary nuclei (191; 192).
Leonard Doncaster (GB) explained the inheritance of tortoiseshell,
which is sex-linked, and related colors in cats (594).
Friedrich Meves (DE) discovered mitochondria in plants (the
tapetal cells of Nymphae anthers) (1503).
Anton Julius Carlson (SE-US) proved that the heartbeat in the Limulus crab is neurogenic by section of
the cardiac nerve (347). This was soon shown to be inapplicable to the hearts of amphibia
and mammals.
William Philipps Dunbar (US) proposed that hay fever is a disease
caused by vegetable poisons contained in the pollen of certain plants. These
substances were connected with the proteid of the pollen grain and of a highly
specific character. He developed methodologies for testing patients'
sensitivity to certain pollens by minuscule exposure to pollen via their eyes
or nasal passages. Dunbar determined that it was the dried cat saliva on cat
hair that caused the allergic reaction. About grass pollen, Dunbar identified
the albumin fraction as the active toxin, discovered changes in the blood that
accompanied exposure to the pollen, and was able to grade individuals' relative
susceptibility to each type of pollen (623; 624).
Charles Scott Sherrington (GB) and Edward George Tandy Liddell
(GB) investigated spinal reflexes such as the knee-jerk. They discovered
reciprocal innervation of motor areas, i.e., when one set of muscles is
stimulated, muscles working against the activity of the first will be inhibited
(Sherrington’s law). The proprioceptive
system, i.e., the brain can judge the tensions upon the muscles and joints
and thereby possess a sense of position and equilibrium. They formulated the
concepts of the final common pathway,
i.e., “The reflex arcs (of the synaptic system) converge in their course so as
to impinge upon links possessed by whole varied groups in common paths. This arrangement culminates in the convergence of
many separately arising arcs upon the efferent-root neuron. This neuron thus
forms a final common path for many different reflex arcs and acts. It is
responsive in various rhythm and intensity, and is relatively unfatigable,” and
the integrative action of the nervous
system. Also, they will be remembered for their contributions to the
physiology of perception, reaction and behavior. They also discovered the stretch reflex (1350; 1960-1962).
Georg Franz Knoop (DE) fed dogs the sodium salts of various
straight-chain fatty acids in which the carbon atom farthest from the carboxyl
group was linked to a phenyl group. Based on the urinary products he deduced
that oxidative degradation of fatty acids occurs by oxidation at the
beta-carbon thereby releasing two carbons at a time from the fatty acid. This
became known as the beta-oxidation theory (517; 1216-1218). This represents one of the first
experiments in which a metabolite was labeled in such a way that end products
could provide evidence of how physiological conversions had occurred.
Gustav Georg Embden (DE) discovered that glycogen was converted to
lactic acid, but he also showed that lactic acid could be converted to glucose.
That is, Embden showed that glucose and lactic acid could be interconverted
with each other in laboratory animals. This interconversion observation would
become one of the most important biochemical pathways for muscle contraction in
all living animals. Ref
Gershom Franklin White (US) reported the isolation of Bacillus X in honeybee (Apis mellifera Linn.) larvae suffering
from American foulbrood (2340). White then renamed the organism Bacillus larvae (2341; 2342).
William Bateson (GB), Edith Rebecca Saunders (GB), and Charles C.
Hurst (GB) discovered intermediate (blended) inheritance in the mint genus
Salvia. In this same article they reported, for the first time, that one
character or trait (comb shape in chickens) could be controlled by more than
one gene. Further research by various geneticists was to show that this is the
general rule rather than the exception. Most characters are controlled by more
than one gene (151; 1759).
Ross Granville Harrison (US) contributed to our knowledge of the
relation of the nervous system to muscle differentiation in the embryo, and the
development and regeneration of peripheral nerves (963; 964).
William Thomas Councilman (US), George B. Magrath (US), and Walter
R. Brinckerhoff (US) observed round or oval acidophilic intranuclear inclusion bodies in Variola infected cells of man and monkeys (466; 1405).
Léon Ambard (FR), Eugene Beaujard (FR) and André-Simon Weill (FR)
discovered the link between salt and high blood pressure in hypertensive
patients studied weeks under different schemes providing very different amounts
of sodium chloride (42-44).
Paul Emil Flechsig (DE) evolved a map
of cortical function that appeared in a report of 1904 to the Central Committee
for Brain Research (758).
Karl Albert Ludwig Aschoff (DE) discovered granuloma in the
myocardium specific for rheumatic fever (66).
Ernst Ferdinand Sauerbruch (DE) introduced a low-pressure surgical
cabinet for preventing lung collapse during thoracic surgery and is credited
with the first operation on the open chest (1892).
Ludolph Brauer (DE) invented the airtight mask that could be fitted
over the face and connected with an oxygen container under the desired
hyperpressure. The oxygen also passed through a bottle of ether, so that both
the anesthetic and oxygen could be given under higher than atmospheric
pressure. This method replaced the cabinet (267).
Felix Jacob Marchand (DE) coined the term atherosclerosis because arteriosclerosis is not sufficient to
include the entire disease processes of the primary fatty and atheromatous
degeneration intimately involved in the sclerosing processes within the blood
vessels. He suggested that atherosclerosis
is responsible for nearly all obstructive processes in the arteries. The Greek athero refers to gruel (1428).
Giuseppe Gradenigo (IT) reported a triad of symptoms consisting of
periorbital unilateral pain related to trigeminal nerve involvement, diplopia
due to sixth nerve palsy and persistent otorrhea, associated with
bacterial otitis media with apex involvement of the petrous part of the
temporal bone (petrositis) (873; 874). It was later named Gradenigo’s syndrome.
Julius Donath (AT) and Karl Landsteiner (AT-US) were the first to
describe an autoimmune disease, paroxysmal
hemoglobinuria. This disease is characterized by the discharge of massive
amounts of hemoglobin, not intact erythrocytes, into the urine. It results from
an antibody of the IgG class directed against the P blood group antigen and is
associated with syphilis and viral
infections and is responsible for paroxysmal
cold hemoglobinuria (593).
Eduard Hitzig (DE) noted that electrical stimulation of a region
in front of the pre-central gyrus in the dog caused combined movements of the
head and eyes (1045).
Thomas Grainger Stewart (GB) and Gordon Morgan Holmes (IE) wrote a
paper about precise localization of destructive lesions in the cerebellum. This
paper contains a description of the Stewart-Holmes
syndrome (epileptic
fits, manifested by jerking movements of one arm) and the first description of the rebound phenomenon (2045).
Edward Albert Schäfer (GB) described a method for administering
artificial respiration. It was especially effective with a person in danger of
drowning (1896).
Kristian Igelsrud (NO) was the first to perform open-chest cardiac
massage in 1901, but William Williams Keen, Jr. (US) did not report this until
a few years later (1175).
Harvey Williams Cushing (US) gave the first report of using a
tourniquet with pneumatic pressure of a measurable degree. This inflatable cuff
was the forerunner of the modern technique used generally in surgery (499).
Max Askanazy (DE-CH) was the first to link osteitis fibrosa cystica with parathyroid
tumors (72).
Paul Charles Dubois (CH) is known for the introduction of
"persuasion therapy", a process that employed a rational approach for
treatment of neurotic disorders. Within this discipline, he developed a
psychotherapeutic methodology that was a form of Socratic dialogue, using the
doctor-patient relationship to persuade the patient to change his/her behavior.
He believed it was necessary to appeal to a patient's intellect and reason in
order to eliminate negative and self-destructive habits. He also maintained it
was necessary for the physician to convince the patient of the irrationality of
his/her neurotic feelings and thought processes (614; 615).
Joseph Grinnell (US) wrote, “two species of approximately the same
food habits are not likely to remain long evenly balanced in numbers in the
same region” (893). Grinnell connected the idea of competitive exclusion to the term niche when he asserted that “no two species regularly established
in a single fauna have precisely the same niche relationships” (894; 895). He was the first to use the word niche to refer to an animal’s ecological
position in the world by defining the ecological
or environmental niche as the
ultimate distributional unit of one species or subspecies (896). Grinnell more fully developed the idea when he wrote “…the
concept of the ultimate distributional unit, within which each species is held
by its structural and instinctive limitations, these being subject only to exceedingly
slow modification down through time” (897).
Georgi Frantsevitch Gause (RU) proposed what has come to be one of
the laws of ecology when he wrote, “It is admitted that as a result of
competition two similar species scarcely ever occupy similar niches, but
displace each other in such a manner that each takes possession of certain
peculiar kinds of food and modes of life in which it has an advantage over its
competitor” (829-832). It is known as the competitive exclusion principle.
Francis Wall Oliver (AU) and Dunkinfield Henry Scott (GB) discovered
evidence for the seed of Lyginodendron,
which led to the removal of the Cycadofilices from the Pteridophyta (ferns,
horsetails, and club-mosses), and their inclusion with the gymnosperms (1670). “We now know that the true ferns
were only present in the coal measures in small and archaic forms
(Coenopteridales) very unlike living ferns and that probably all the
conspicuous fernlike leaves of that era belonged to seed plants” (1423).
Charles H. Sternberg (US) discovered the fossil remains of a
creature showing both amphibian and reptilian characteristics. Ferdinand Broili
(DE) would name it Seymouria baylorensis
for Seymour, Texas in Baylor County (296).
The Journal of Experimental
Zoology was founded.
1905
"Ludwig was absolutely unselfish.
He loved his science and rejoiced in the scientific achievements of his
students. He freely gave to every earnest worker from the vast store of his
physiological knowledge, and his experience in experimental methods. He became
at once the friend of each of his pupils, making him feel that he had a
personal interest in him and in his work. This feeling spread throughout the
laboratory, where good-fellowship reigned, each man becoming interested not
only in his own problem, but glad to lend a helpful hand to every other,
rejoicing when a research was successful and sorry when the problem baffled. I
can recall Ludwig’s enthusiastic, joyous shout, as he called all who could
leave their work to come and witness some physiological process revealing
itself in its true light for the first time, or some unusually suggestive
histological or anatomical preparation. Hearty congratulations followed, all
rejoicing in the new discovery. And then came one of those delightful talks,
leading us forward to the borderland of science, and giving us glimpses into
that fascinating, mysterious land—the unknown." Warren P. Lombard (US)
speaking of Karl Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig (DE) the great physiologist and his
former teacher (1371). More than two hundred and fifty men from a
dozen countries came to study under this great master.
"In the Vertebrates we meet with
two great categories of white corpuscles, of which one group resembles those of
the invertebrates in that they also possess a single large nucleus and an
amoeboid protoplasm. These are the macrophages of the blood and of the lymph,
and are intimately connected with the macrophages of such organs as the spleen,
lymphatic glands, and bone marrow. Another group of white corpuscles in the
Vertebrata is made up of small amoeboid cells, which are distinguished by
having a nucleus, which, although single, is divided into several lobes. These
are the microphages [neutrophils]. Phagocytosis is exhibited not only by the
macrophages but also, in a high degree, by the microphages which stand out as
the defensive cells par excellence against microorganisms [… ]. The
microphages, on the other hand, appear to play their part, specially, in acute
infections." Élie Metchnikoff (RU-FR) (1500).
"Science is built up
of facts, just as a house is built up of stones; but an accumulation of facts
is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house." Henri Poincaré (1750).
"Nothing is constant but change! All existence is a perpetual
flux of ‘being and becoming’! That is the broad lesson of the evolution of the
world." Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel; Ernst Heinrich Philipp
August Häcke; Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Heckel (917).
Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer (DE) was awarded the
Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his advancement of organic chemistry and the
chemical industry, through his work on organic dyes and hydroaromatic
compounds.
Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch (DE) was awarded the Nobel Prize in
Physiology or Medicine "for his
investigations and discoveries in relation to tuberculosis."
William Weber Coblentz (US), between 1903-1905, pioneered infrared
spectrophotometry as a method for determining the presence of specific atomic
groupings. He was the first to show that different atomic and molecular
groupings absorbed specific and characteristic wavelengths in the infrared
region (427; 428).
Richard Adolf Zsigmondy (AT-DE) applied the centrifuge to the
study of colloids, making a more detailed understanding of protoplasmic
constituents possible (2458).
Vladimir Sergeyevich Gulewitsch (RU) and R.P. Krimberg (RU) isolated a
new compound from meat extracts. They named it carnitine from carnos
(meat) (910).
Masaji Tomita (JP) and Yuzo Sendju (JP) determined
the chemical structure of carnitine to be 3-hydroxy-4-trimethylamino butyric
acid (2124).
Cornelis Adrianus Pekelharing (NL) found that very minute
quantities of a substance in the whey of milk are as capable as whole milk of
promoting health in mice receiving adequate protein from some other source (1727; 2166).
Valdemar Henriques (NL) and C. Hansen (NL) demonstrated that
autolyzed (self-digested) pancreas or mucosa not only supplied rats with amino
acids for their protein synthesis but also supplied them with something of
necessity in their diet other than amino acids, carbohydrates, fats, and salts (1002).
Richard Anton Burian (CS) discovered xanthine oxidase, which catalyzes the conversion of xanthine to
uric acid and hypoxanthine to xanthine (321).
Arthur Harden (GB) and William John Young (GB-AU) showed that the
enzymes were not consumed during the breakdown of sugar by yeast, however the
reaction slowed down even when there was ample sugar and enzyme present. If
they added inorganic phosphate the reaction speeded up again. This was
initially a puzzling finding because phosphorus is neither present in sugar,
nor alcohol, nor carbon dioxide, nor enzyme. Their search for the fate of the
added phosphate led them to discover that phosphorylated sugars are being
manufactured. They isolated a hexose diphosphate (the Harden-Young ester) from
the fermentation mix (945; 951-954; 2444). Note:
They realized that fermentation requires the presence of both a heat-labile
component they called “zymase” and a low molecular weight, heat-stable fraction
called “cozymase.” (It was later shown that zymase
contains several enzymes whereas cozymase consists of metal ions, ATP, ADP, and
coenzymes such as NAD.) They presented an equation for overall alcoholic
fermentation in 1908.
Phoebus Aaron Theodor Levene (RU-US) and Albert L. Raymond (US)
characterized the structure of the Harden-Young ester as
fructose-1,6-diphosphate (1333).
Leonid Aleksandrovich Ivanov (RU) had independently discovered
that organic phosphates are produced during alcoholic fermentation (1108).
Arthur Harden (GB) made another important set of observations
revealing that in the presence of the inhibitor, fermenting yeast extracts
showed an accumulation of two phosphate esters, 3-phosphoglycerate and
2-phosphoglycerate. On the other hand, the inhibitor iodoacetate caused an
accumulation of fructose-1,6-diphosphate. Once these intermediates were
identified, it became possible to study the enzymatic reactions by which they
were formed and utilized. Harden’s work marks the beginning of the study of
intermediary metabolism. Ref
The first version of International
Rules (Code) of Botanical Nomenclature (ICBN) was approved in Vienna,
Austria.
Frederick Frost Blackman (GB) and Gabrielle Louise Caroline Matthaei (GB) proposed that
photosynthesis consists of a light-dependent reaction (the 'light' reaction)
and a temperature-dependent reaction (the 'dark' reaction). Both these
reactions are going on simultaneously. The 'light' reaction feeds something to
the 'dark' reaction. As the intensity of illumination is increased, the rate of
photosynthesis (as measured, for example, by the volume of oxygen produced each
minute) does not increase indefinitely but approaches a saturation state in
which a further increase of light intensity has no effect. This suggests a
two-stage process in which only one stage can be accelerated by light (221; 1453).
Otto Heinrich Warburg (DE) later called the process of limiting
the rate of carbon assimilation at high intensities of illumination the Blackman reaction (2283).
John Sidney Edkins (GB) showed that extracts of the gastric antral
mucosa stimulate secretion of acid by the oxyntic mucosa, and postulated that
his extracts contained a hormone, which he called gastrin (640; 641).
Helen R. Gregory (GB), Roderic Alfred Gregory (GB), Paul Martin
Hardy (GB), Duncan S. Jones (GB), George Wallace Kenner (GB), Robert Charles
Sheppard (GB) and Hilda J. Tracy (GB) determined the structure of gastrin (890; 891).
John Christopher Anderson (GB), Moira A. Barton (GB), Roderic
Alfred Gregory (GB), Paul Martin Hardy (GB), George Wallace Kenner (GB), John
Keith MacLeod (GB), Jean Preston (GB), Robert Charles Sheppard (GB) and John
Selwyn Morley (GB) described their synthesis of gastrin (47).
William Henry Howell (US) discovered the remarkable hypotensive
effect of acetylcholine (1068).
John Newport Langley (GB) introduced the concept of receptor substance or synaptic substance, “probably not in the
nerves, but in the cells in which they end.”
Langley said, “I conclude that in all cells two constituents at
least must be distinguished, (1) substances concerned with carrying out the
chief functions of the cells, such as contraction, secretion, the formation of
special metabolic products and (2) receptive substances especially liable to
change and capable of setting the chief substances in motion. Further, that
nicotine, curare, atropine, pilocarpine, strychnine, and most other alkaloids,
as well as the effective material of internal secretions produce their effects
by combining with the receptive substance...” (1297).
Nettie Maria Stevens (US) and Edmund Beecher Wilson (US)
independently discovered the existence of the so-called sex chromosomes. Stevens worked with the beetle Tenebrio while Wilson worked with
several genera of hemipteran insects, including Anasa tristis (2044; 2387-2390). This was not the first time that sex
determination was associated with a chromosome, but it was the first proof. See, Henking, 1891 and McClung, 1901. Thomas
Harrison Montgomery, Jr. is credited with coining heterochromosomes in 1904 and autosomes
in 1906 (1542; 1543).
William Bateson (GB), Edith Rebecca Saunders (GB), Reginald
Crundall Punnett (GB), and Charles Chamberlain Hurst (GB) discovered linkage and genetic interaction (152; 154). Punnett has two species of marine worms named for him, Cerbratulus punnetti, Punnettia splendia.
William Bateson (GB), Edith Rebecca Saunders (GB), and Reginald
Crundall Punnett (GB) discovered that two genes behaving in a recessive
epistatic mode control flower color in Lathyrus (sweet peas) and Matthiola
(stocks) (153; 1759).
William Bateson (GB) first suggested using the word
"genetics" (from the Greek gennō, γεννώ;
"to give birth") to describe the study of inheritance and the science
of variation in a personal letter to Adam Sedgwick (1854–1913,
zoologist at Cambridge, not the Adam Sedgwick (1785–1873) who had
been Darwin's professor), dated 18 April 1905 (142).
William Curtis Farabee (US) determined that brachydactyly in
humans can be explained by Mendelian principles (715).
The first human pedigree was published. It showed the inheritance
of shortened hands and fingers in a Norwegian village (1157).
William Bateson (GB) and Reginald Crundall Punnett (GB) made
several reports to the Evolution Committee of the Royal Society of London from
1905 to 1908 in which they related the discovery of two new genetic principles:
gametic coupling and gene interaction. They studied poultry
comb form, demonstrating significant departure from Mendelian ratios for some
gene pairs (148-150; 1759).
Thomas Hunt Morgan (US) proposed
that the frequency with which recombinants took place was related to the
physical distance separating the genes on the chromosome and further proposed
that this could be used for mapping the positions of genes relative to each
other. This phenomenon was clarified and called gene linkage (1555).
Alfred Henry Sturtevant (US), based on his work with Morgan,
created the first genetic map (2070). See
Sutton, 1903.
John Burdon Sanderson Haldane (GB), Alexander Dalzell Sprunt (GB),
and Naomi Mitchison Haldane (GB) were the first to demonstrate linkage of genes
in the mouse (931).
Lucien Claude Jules Cuénot (FR) discovered a lethal allele, the
yellow coat color allele in mice, even though he did not interpret it correctly (492).
William Ernest Castle (US) and Clarence Cook Little (US) proved
that the yellow allele has two expressions: a dominant one on coat color, and a
recessive one on viability, since yellow homozygotes died early in the
embryonic state (366).
William B. Kirkham (US) later discovered that the homozygous
yellow embryos died in utero (1202).
Konstantin Sergejewitsch Mereschkowsky (RU) proposed the theory of
the symbiotic origin of the eukaryotic cell and introduced the term symbiogenesis to signify the emergence
of new species with identifiably new physiologies and structures as a
consequence of stable integration of symbionts. It stated that the chloroplast
and mitochondria of eukaryotic cells had their origins from endosymbiotic
cyanobacteria and aerobic bacteria, respectively, whose ancestors were once
captured and incorporated by a primitive, anaerobic, heterotrophic host. Many
others would later refine this theory (370; 371; 1194; 1195; 1436; 1496).
Robert K. Trench (US), Richard W. Greene (US), Barbara G. Bystrom
(US), Merriley E. Trench (US), and Leonard Muscatine (US) found contemporary
organisms that offer some striking examples of symbiotic relationships with a
similar history (2128; 2129).
The last yellow fever epidemic on the North American
continent occurred in New Orleans, Louisiana. The epidemic ended in the fall
after a large-scale mosquito eradication program (1488).
Stamen Grigoroff (BG) isolated Lactobacillus
bulgaricus from Bulgarian fermented milk (892).
Alfred T. MacConkey (GB) used bile salts to select for lactose
fermenting bacteria in fecal samples (1396; 1397).
M. Casimir Wize (PL) found that a chytridiaceous fungus was
parasitizing the larvae and pupae of Cleonus and Anisolplia (Coleoptera). He
named the fungus Olpidiopsis
ucrainica (2417).
Fritz Richard Schaudinn (DE) and P. Erich Hoffman (DE) used a
special staining technique to demonstrate the spirochaete causing syphilis in serum obtained from a
genital lesion by Hoffmann. They named it Spirochaeta
pallida (1920; 1921). The organism is now called Treponema
pallidum.
Aldo Castellani; Count of Chisiamaio (IT) discovered, Treponema pertenue, the spirochete
causing yaws (359).
Élie Metchnikoff; Ilya Metchinikoff; Iljitj Metchnikov; Iljitj
Metschnikov; Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov; Ilja Metjnikov (RU-FR) noted that mononuclear phagocytes from
animals resistant to certain bacterial infections had increased competence for
ingesting and killing these microbes. This phenomenon became known as
macrophage activation (1500).
Sergei Nikolaevich Winogradsky (RU) and Martinus Willem Beijerinck
(NL) observed that the reason microbiologists so often succeed in isolating
specific microbes from a given sample of soil or water is due to a
methodological principle called the ecological approach, often designated as
the principle of elective or enrichment culture. Its application depends on a
well-considered selection of the conditions in a primary culture medium, thus
causing preferential growth of a certain kind of germ, ultimately leading to a
predominance of the conditionally fittest. Typically, these enrichment cultures
offer the microbe a single simple carbon compound as the sole source of carbon (181).
Ludvig Hektoen (US) demonstrated by subcutaneous injections of
volunteers with blood taken from measles patients that the measles (rubeola)
virus circulates in the blood during the initial thirty hours of the rash (989). Hektoen was also the first to grow blood cultures from living
patients (988).
Martinus Willem Beijerinck (NL) published little concerning his
original concepts and approaches, however, upon being awarded the Leeuwenhoek
medal by the Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen in Amsterdam he said, “I am
happy to note the way in which I approach microbiology has the approval of the
best judges. This approach can be concisely stated as the study of microbial
ecology, i.e., of the relation between environmental conditions and the special
forms of life corresponding to them. It is my conviction that, in our present
state of understanding, this is the most necessary and fruitful direction to
guide us in organizing our knowledge of that part of nature which deals with the
lowest limits of the organic world, and which constantly keeps before our mind
the profound problem of the origin of life itself. Therefore, it is a great
satisfaction to me that the Academy apparently wishes to honor the experimenter
who exploits this field.
In an experimental sense the ecological approach to microbiology
consists of two complementary phases, which give rise to an endless number of
experiments. On the one hand it leads to investigating the conditions for the
development of organisms that have for some reason or other, perhaps
fortuitously, come to our attention; on the other hand to the discovery of
living organisms that appear under predetermined conditions, either because
they alone can develop, or because they are the more fit and win out over their
competitors. Especially, this latter method, in reality nothing but the
broadest application of the elective culture method, is fruitful and truly
scientific, and it is no exaggeration to claim that the rapid and surprising
advances in general microbiology are due to this methodology. Nevertheless, and
this in spite of the fact that Leeuwenhoek, more than two hundred years ago,
already used this aspect of micro-ecology in some of his studies, and that
Pasteur was enabled to make most of his great discoveries because he was guided
by the same principle, the number of conscious exponents has so far remained
very small. And I feel that I certainly may be reckoned among them because of
the enthusiasm that is in me to contribute to the grand task can here be
accomplished” (2164; 2331).
Cornelis Bernardus Kees van Niel (NL) remarked, “Beijerinck’s
major contributions can be considered as the first direct experimental
investigations of Darwin’s principle of natural selection. In the enrichment
cultures the experimentally defined environmental conditions are the selecting
agent, and the outcome of the cultures can provide an unambiguous answer to the
question as to what organisms among the many types present in the inoculum are
best fit to cope with the environment” (2167).
Shigetane Ishiwata (JP) discovered that the Sotto-Kin disease of silkworms is caused by a new species of
bacterium, which he named Sotto-Bacillen.
This organism would later be named Bacillus
thuringiensis (1103).
Élie Metchnikoff; Ilya Metchinikoff; Iljitj Metchnikov; Iljitj
Metschnikov; Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov; Ilja Metjnikov (RU-FR) and Pierre Paul Émile Roux (FR)
demonstrated that syphilis may be transmitted to anthropoid apes, such as the
chimpanzee and gibbon, and, with less certainty to monkeys (1502).
Louis Joseph Alcide Raillet (FR) and Albert
Henry (FR) described six female immature Oesophagostomum
brumpti (nematode) worms that Alexandre Joseph Emilé Brumpt (FR) found in tumors of the caecum and colon, in 1902, when he performed autopsy on a
30-year old African man, who had been living near the River Omo, East-Africa (309; 310; 1767).
William Bateson (GB) coined the term genetics to denote the science of heredity, but the word had been
used earlier (143; 144).
Count Grafen Emmerich Festetics (HU), a prominent sheep breeder
from Hungary, wrote Genetic Laws. It
included the observation that progeny inherit traits from their parents, and
that traits of grandparents can reappear in the offspring of their offspring (732; 733).
Hugo Marie de Vries (NL), while studying the genetics of the
evening primrose, Oenothera lamarckiana,
found an unusual variant among his plants. O.
lamarckiana has a chromosome number of 2N = 14. The variant had a
chromosome number of 2N = 28. He found that he was unable to breed this variant
with O. lamarckiana. He named this
new species O. gigas (553).
Anne Mae Lutz (US) proved that the gigas mutation in the evening primrose contains twice the usual
chromosome number. This led to the analysis and artificial production of
polyploidy (1390).
Lettice Digby (GB) observed that the primrose species Primula verticillata and P. floribunda can cross to produce a
sterile hybrid. This hybrid was called the Kew primrose (P. kewensis) and possessed 18 chromosomes. Digby observed that
these sterile hybrids occasionally gave rise to fertile Kew primroses. Using
microscopic analysis, she proved that the fertile hybrid was a polyploid
containing 36 chromosomes. This was the first documented case of a polyploid hybrid (574).
Øjvind Winge (DK), unaware of Digby's results, speculated that
speciation could occur by interspecific hybridization followed by chromosome
doubling. Winge believed that hybrid sterility was caused by unbalanced
chromosome sets. He reasoned that upon doubling, a proper pairing partner would
be available to each chromosome resulting in fertility (2406).
Roy Elwood Clausen (DK-US) and Thomas Harper Goodspeed (US) used Nicotiana tabacum to experimentally demonstrate Øjvind Winge’s hypothesis of
the origin of species by amphidiploidy.
George D. Karpchenko (RU) did the same using radish and cabbage (399; 400; 1168; 1169). It was soon realized that
allopolyploids—hybrid species that contain two or more diploid sets of parental
genomes—are common in nature.
W.C. Frank Newton (GB) and Caroline Pellew (GB) noted that
spontaneous hybrids of Primula
verticillata and P. floribunda
set tetraploid seed on at least three occasions during 1905, 1923 and 1926 (1642).
Rowland H. Biffen (GB) was the first to breed crops for disease
resistance in cereal rusts using Mendelian principles. But variability in the
pathogen was not fully appreciated (210).
Elvin Charles Stakman (US) and Frank Joseph Piemeisal (US), in
1917, reported that stem rust in cereals and grasses comprised six biological
forms. These forms were distinguished from each other morphologically and parasitically
and were differentiated on selected cereal and grass hosts (2024). Note:
This led to research on variation and variability of plant pathogens, and
subsequently of all microorganisms, and the breeding of plants for resistance
to specific races. Races became essential also in microorganisms important in
industry, e.g. in the production of acids and enzymes from organisms, and in
medicine in the development of antibiotics.
Edwin G. Conklin (US), used the ascidian Cynthia (now Steyla), for
his discovery. The mature oocytes of these animals have a large transparent
germinal vesicle. The interior consists of a mass of gray yolk and the
periphery contains a yellow pigment. When the germinal vesicle ruptures at the
onset of meiosis, it liberates a quantity of clear material. At fertilization
the sperm enters near the vegetal pole, and this starts a dramatic
rearrangement of the cytoplasm.
Conklin discovered that at the close of the first cleavage these
distinctively colored regions of the embryo have a precise relationship with
the structures that will form subsequently. The fate of the yellow crescent is
to form muscles and mesenchyme, the gray yolky cytoplasm forms endoderm, and
the clear cytoplasm of the animal hemisphere forms ectodermal structures (444).
Charles Zeleny (CZ-US) showed that removal of the eyestalk
shortened the intermolt period in crustaceans (2452).
Max Kauffmann (DE) showed that the nutritional value of various proteins depends upon their constituent amino acids. Proteins such as gelatin lack some necessary amino acids (1173)