Tag: Science
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Jean Marie Poiseuille: Physics and mathematics
Son of a carpenter, Jean Marie Poiseuille was born in Paris in 1799 and began his studies in physics and mathematics in 1815. When the school was disbanded for political reasons he switched to medicine and after graduating opened a practice in Paris. He became a member of the Academy of Medicine in Paris, later…
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Jules Amar (1879–1935). A method to help soldiers who were amputated or mutilated during the First World War reintegrate society
Philippe CampilloZiad Joseph RahalFrance Jules Amar (1879–1935) may not be well known in medical texts, but his work helped initiate two important scientific disciplines: the physiology of work and ergonomics. In The performance of the human machine: research on work (1909)1 Amar wrote of the need for a biological analysis of social life, especially that…
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Cancer class
Emily DieckmanTuscon, Arizona, United States When my parents told me about the cancer, everything felt different. It seemed the entire world had suddenly gone from plain font to italics – everything was still legible, but newly emphasized by this cold, sharp, intrusive fact. I was not prepared to make room for something like this. I…
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Thomas Bayes and Bayes’ Theorem in medicine
Geoffrey BairdSeattle, Washington, United States Medical nomenclature is often ridiculous. One professor in my medical school used to say of misnomers in medicine that they were like the Holy Roman Empire, which was neither holy, nor Roman, nor much of an empire. So goes the medical and mathematical principle of Bayes’ theorem. Thomas Bayes was…
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How a bishop unwittingly kick-started the DNA revolution
William KingstonDublin, Ireland In 1943 a series of lectures was delivered in Trinity College, Dublin, which had profound scientific and medical consequences. Their title was What is Life? and it is no exaggeration to claim that they led to a revolution in our knowledge and use of genes. The lecturer was Erwin Schrödinger, who had…
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The Rockefeller Institute and the growth of cell biology
Adil MenonBrookline, Massachusetts, United States In 1995 Nobel-winning cell biologist George Palade stated that “a newborn baby needs, of course, a friendly, comfortable cradle, which was provided by the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research and thus became the American cradle of cell biology.”1 This essay explores the unique aspects of this cradle, which nurtured the…
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Using bacteria in cancer therapy
Andy TayLos Angeles, California, United States Cancer is a complex disease whose various causes include bacterial infections such as Helicobacter pylori leading to gastric cancer.1 Bacteria, however, can also be used to treat cancer, a treatment so effective against high grade non-invasive bladder cancer that since 1990, it has remained the preferred therapy.2 The history…
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Redefining the war on cancer
Justin SheaOntario, Canada Ever since Richard Nixon declared war on cancer in 1971, the public has been convinced that the only way to deal with the disease is through combat1. But after forty years with destructive remedies such as chemo and immunological therapy failing to guarantee permanent remission, could it be possible that the medical…
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Hume and autism-causing vaccines
Trevor KleeCambridge, Massachusetts, United States In 1998 the British medical researcher Andrew Wakefield announced a startling discovery in one of the world’s most prestigious medical journals, The Lancet. He had found that the Measles, Mumps, Rubella (MMR) vaccine seemed to have caused both bowel disease and autism in children.1 This was startling because the MMR vaccine…