Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Science

  • Sports and the uneven playing field

    Jayant RadhakrishnanDarien, Illinois, United States “All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.” — Napoleon (the pig) Animal Farm by George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair, 1903 – 1950). The motto of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) — Citius (Faster), Altius (Higher), Fortius (Stronger) is incomplete without “si ego te permitto” (if…

  • Lina Shtern and the blood brain barrier

    Irving RosenToronto, Ontario, Canada Future generations will remember our age for unbelievable electronic progress, but also for the bloody conflicts of World War II, characterized by dictatorial figures that darkened the lives of so many productive, innocent people. Among these was Dr. Lina Shtern, whose pioneer work permitted her to envision and name the blood-brain…

  • Book review: The Origins of Modern Science

    Arpan K. BanerjeeSolihull, United Kingdom Science and medicine have long been intertwined: many advances in the field of medicine would not have been possible without prior knowledge of fundamental science. It is not surprising, therefore, that a medical historian would also find the history of science fascinating. In this book, Ofer Gal has described the…

  • The Valsalva maneuver

    JMS PearceHull, England, UK It is a paradox that the discovery of the Valsalva maneuver did not relate to cardiovascular physiology but to the treatment of discharges from the ear. Valsalva’s maneuver is now used physiologically1 to test cardiac and autonomic function, and in several other diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. The surgeon Leonard of Bertapaglia…

  • Mitochondrial DNA: a maternal gift

    Marshall LichtmanRochester, New York, United States DNA is arrayed on twenty-three pairs of chromosomes in human cell nuclei. It is coiled tightly around proteins called histones that together with DNA form a chromosome. The largest chromosome carries several thousand genes and the smallest several hundred. DNA is so tightly wound that uncoiled from a single…

  • Pursuing “conclusions infinite”: The divine inspiration of Georg Cantor

    Sylvia KarasuNew York, New York, United States There is a “fine line between brilliance and madness”: the distinction, for example, between a “revolutionary” mathematical theory and psychotic thinking may well have to do with what can be done with the theory, i.e., its “significant results.”1 “The mentally ill mathematician” is like the “knight errant, mortified…

  • Leonhard Thurneysser: Scholar, alchemist, and miracle doctor

    A highly controversial figure even in his time, Leonhard Thurneysser remains to this very day for some a revered scientist and for others a resolute quack. Born 1531 in Basel, he was the son of a goldsmith and followed in his father’s profession. He also studied with a physician and alchemist but never attended any…

  • How Britain rescued scientists from Nazi tyranny

    JMS PearceHull, England In March 1933 while visiting Vienna, William Beveridge, Director of the London School of Economics, learned that Hitler had just decreed it illegal for “non-Aryan,” mostly Jewish people to hold posts in the Civil Service. Many lawyers, doctors, and academics were deemed “undesirable” and dismissed instantly. Nazi concentration camps, mass desecration, medical…

  • Omentum: Much more than “policeman of the abdomen”

    Ashok SinghChicago, Illinois, United States The omentum is a curtain-like tissue that hangs from the bottom edge of the stomach and covers the abdominal organs below. It is a lattice of adipose (fat) cells peppered with islands of compact tissue known as milky spots, which are clusters of macrophages, lymphocytes, and hematopoietic cells. The omentum…

  • Augusta Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace (1815–1852)

    JMS Pearce Hull, England It is undeniable that computer science and technology play an important part in medical investigation and research, and universally in the transmission of information. Everyone remembers Charles Babbage, (1791-1871) (Fig 1) inventor of the computer and Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, but an almost equally important figure has been largely overlooked.…