Discovery of the vaccinations

Edward Jenner

Have you had smallpox? Polio? Typhoid? Prob a bly not. However, such infectious diseases used to plague humankind The word plague comes from one of these killer diseases the bubonic plague. Throughout the four teenth and fifteenth centuries, the plague killed nearly half of the pop u la tion of Europe.

Smallpox killed over 100,000 people a year for a cen tury and left millions horribly scarred and disfigured  The influenza epidemic of 1918 killed 25 million worldwide. Po lio killed thousands in the early twen ti eth cen tury and left millions paralyzed.

One simple dis cov ery not only stopped the spread of each of these dis eases, it vir tu ally eradicated them. That discovery was vaccinations. Vaccinations have saved millions of lives and have pre vented unimaginable amounts of misery and suffering. American children are now reg u larly vaccinated for as many as 15 diseases.

Read More

Discovering the Oxygen

Joseph Priestley

Priestley’s discovery of oxygen sparked a chemical revolution. He was the first person to isolate a single gaseous element in the mix ture of gas ses we call “air.” Before Priestley’s dis cov ery, sci en tific study had focused on metals. By dis cov er ing that air wasn't a uniform thing, Priestley created a new interest in the study of gasses and air.

Because oxygen is a central element of com bus tion, Priestley’s discovery isolate to an un der stand ing of what it means to burn something and to an un der stand ing of the conversion of matter into energy during chemical reactions.

Finally, Priestley es tab lished a simple but elegant and ef fec tive process for conducting analysis of new gas ses and gas eous el e ments. What did it look like? Would it burn (first a candle and then wood splinters ? Would it keep a mouse alive? Was it absorbed by water?

Read More

Discovering of the Bacteria

Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (1673)

Just as Galileo used his telescope to open the hu man ho ri zon to the planets and stars of space, so van Leeuwenhoek used his microscope to open human awareness to the microscopic world that was invisibly small and that no one had even dreamed existed He dis covered protozoa bacteria, blood cells, sperm, and capillary s His work founded the science of mi cro bi ol ogy and opened tissue studies and plant studies to the microscopic world. He com pleted hu man un der stand ing of the circulatory system.

Anton van Leeuwenhoek was born in 1632 in Delft, Holland  With no advanced schooling, he was apprenticed as a cloth merchant and as sumed that buying and selling cloth would be his career.

Read More

Discovering human circulatory system

William Harvey

The human circulatory system represents the virtual definition of life. No system is more critical to our ex is tence. Yet only 400 years ago, no one understood our cir cu la tory system  Many se ri ously thought that the thumping inside the chest was the voice of the conscience trying to be heard. Most thought that blood was cre ated in the liver and con sumed by the mus cles. Some still thought that ar ter ies were filled with air.

William Harvey discovered the actual function of the major elements of the circulatory system (heart, lungs, arteries  and veins) and created the first complete and accurate picture of human blood cir cu la tion. Harvey was also the first to use the sci en tific method for bi o -log i cal stud ies. Ev ery sci en tist since has followed his ex am ple. Harvey’s 1628 book rep re -sents the beginning of modern physiology.

Read More

Discovering human anatomy

Andreas Vesalius

The human anatomy ref er ences used by doctors through the year A.D. 1500 were actually based mostly on animal studies, more myth and error than truth. Andreas Vesalius was the first to insist on dissec tions, on exact phys i o log i cal ex per i ment and direct b ser va tion scientific methods to create his anatomy guides. His were the first re li able, accurate books on the structure and workings of the human body. Versalius’s work demol ished the long-held reliance on the 1,500-year-old an a tom i cal work by the early Greek, Galen, and marked a per ma nent turning point for med i cine. For the first time, ac tual an a tom i cal fact replaced conjecture as the basis for medical profession.

Andreas Vesalius was born in Brussels in 1515. His father  a doctor in the royal court,had collected an ex cep tional medical library. Young Vesalius poured over each vol ume and showed immense cu ri os ity about the func tion ing of living things. He often caught and dissected small animals and insects.

Read More