Nobel Prize in Medicine..1979

Werner Arber

Daniel Nathans

Hamilton O. Smith

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1978 was awarded jointly to Werner Arber, Daniel Nathans and Hamilton O. Smith "for the discovery of restriction enzymes and their application to problems of molecular genetics".

More of Serendipitous discoveries in Medicine and Surgery.

Pharmacology has a particularly rich history of serendipity. The discovery of penicillin by Alexander Fleming is the best known example. Similarly, the concept that certain chemicals can be used to cure cancer developed after soldiers exposed to mustard gas in World War II developed reduced numbers of white cells in the blood, leading to the use of the chemically related nitrogen mustard as an anti-leukemic drug. The hallucinogenic properties of LSD unfolded when Albert Hoffmann ingested some accidentally while working to develop a drug to control hemorrhage after childbirth and migraine. Serendipity even has a major role in Arthur Hailey's novel Strong medicine in the discovery of an aphrodisiac. In an example of life imitating art, the ability of the new anti-impotence drug sildenafil (Viagra) was discovered accidentally during a search for a cardiovascular vasodilator.
Examples of serendipity also exist in surgery. Microvascular surgery originated when had to join small blood vessels in a dog during an experiment. Realizing that this required the help of a microscope, he proceeded to use one — but also recognized its potential for surgical practice. Another example of serendipity is the surgical glove, developed by Julius H. Jacobson IIWilliam Halsted to prevent his operation-room nurse (whom he subsequently married) from developing dermatitis due to the mercuric chloride used for asepsis. Halsted asked the Goodyear Rubber Company to fashion thin rubber gloves for her. That post-operative infections decreased following the use of gloves was a later but much more useful offshoot of this invention.

More of Serendipitous discoveries in Medivine

Accidental Discoveries Accidents in medicine: The idea sends chills down your spine as you conjure up thoughts of misdiagnoses, mistakenly prescribed drugs, and wrongly amputated limbs. Yet while accidents in the examining room or on the operating table can be regrettable, even tragic, those that occur in the laboratory can sometimes lead to spectacular advances, life-saving treatments, and Nobel Prizes.

A seemingly insignificant finding by one researcher leads to a breakthrough discovery by another; a physician methodically pursuing the answer to a medical conundrum over many years suddenly has a "Eureka" moment; a scientist who chooses to study a contaminant in his culture rather than tossing it out stumbles upon something entirely new. Here we examine three of medical history's most fortuitous couplings of great minds and great luck.

A laborer scrapes the bark from a cinchona tree. The bark is then sundried and pulverized to make the drug quinine.

Quinine
The story behind the chance discovery of the anti-malarial drug quinine may be more legend than fact, but it is nevertheless a story worthy of note. The account that has gained the most currency credits a South American Indian with being the first to find a medical application for quinine. According to legend, the man unwittingly ingested quinine while suffering a malarial fever in a jungle high in the Andes. Needing desperately to quench his thirst, he drank his fill from a small, bitter-tasting pool of water. Nearby stood one or more varieties of cinchona, which grows from Colombia to Bolivia on humid slopes above 5,000 feet. The bark of the cinchona, which the indigenous people knew as quina-quina, was thought to be poisonous. But when this man's fever miraculously abated, he brought news of the medicinal tree back to his tribe, which began to use its bark to treat malaria.

Since the first officially noted use of quinine to fight malaria occurred in a community of Jesuit missionaries in Lima, Peru in 1630, historians have surmised that Indian tribes taught the missionaries how to extract the chemical quinine from cinchona bark. In any case, the Jesuits' use of quinine as a malaria medication was the first documented use of a chemical compound to successfully treat an infectious disease. To this day, quinine-based anti-malarials are widely used as effective treatments against the growth and reproduction of malarial parasites in humans.

A depiction of Edward Jenner vaccinating James Phipps, a boy of eight, on May 14, 1796.

Smallpox vaccination
In 1796, Edward Jenner, a British scientist and surgeon, had a brainstorm that ultimately led to the development of the first vaccine. A young milkmaid had told him how people who contracted cowpox, a harmless disease easily picked up during contact with cows, never got smallpox, a deadly scourge.
With this in mind, Jenner took samples from the open cowpox sores on the hands of a young dairymaid named Sarah Nelmes and inoculated eight-year-old James Phipps with pus he extracted from Nelmes' sores. (Experimenting on a child would be anathema today, but this was the 18^th century.) The boy developed a slight fever and a few lesions but remained for the most part unscathed. A few months later, Jenner gave the boy another injection, this one containing smallpox. James failed to develop the disease, and the idea behind the modern vaccine was born.

Though doctors and scientists would not begin to understand the biological basis of immunity for at least 50 years after Jenner's first inoculation, the technique of vaccinating against smallpox using the human strain of cowpox soon became a common and effective practice worldwide.

Physicist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (1845-1923), discoverer of the X-ray.

X-Rays
X-rays have become an important tool for medical diagnoses, but their discovery in 1895 by the German physicist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen had little to do with medical experimentation. Röntgen was studying cathode rays, the phosphorescent stream of electrons used today in everything from televisions to fluorescent light bulbs. One earlier scientist had found that cathode rays can penetrate thin pieces of metal, while another showed that these rays could light up a fluorescent screen placed an inch or two away from a thin aluminum "window" in the glass tube.
 

Röntgen wanted to determine if he could see cathode rays escaping from a glass tube completely covered with black cardboard. While performing this experiment, Röntgen noticed that a glow appeared in his darkened laboratory several feet away from his cardboard-covered glass tube. At first he thought a tear in the paper sheathing was allowing light from the high-voltage coil inside the cathode-ray tube to escape. But he soon realized he had happened upon something entirely different. Rays of light were passing right through the thick paper and appearing on a fluorescent screen over a yard away.
Röntgen found that this new ray, which had many characteristics different from the cathode ray he had been studying, could penetrate solids and even record the image of a human skeleton on a photographic negative. In 1901, the first year of the Nobel Prize, Röntgen won for his accidental discovery of what he called the "X-ray," which physicians worldwide soon adopted as a standard medical tool.

Nobel Prize ion medicine and Physiology..1979

Allan M. Cormack

Godfrey N. Hounsfield

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1979 was awarded jointly to Allan M. Cormack and Godfrey N. Hounsfield "for the development of computer assisted tomography"

Benjamin Franklin..Multifaceted Inventor, Philosopher and Statesman

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN (1706-1790)

The Franklin Stove

Benjamin Franklin was probably the most significant "founding father" of the United States of America who never served as its President. But he was much more than a statesman: he was a man of letters, a publisher, a philosopher, a scientist, and the first major American inventor.
Franklin was born in Boston in 1706. At age 12, he was apprenticed to his older brother James, a printer; but Franklin resented being ordered about, and so five years later he virtually ran away from home. He moved to Philadelphia, then London, then back to Philadelphia, where he established his own printing office (1728). Like his contemporary inventor Benjamin Banneker, Franklin used his polymathic knowledge to publish an almanac ("Poor Richard: An Almanack" - 1732-58).
In 1748, Franklin retired from printing, in order to devote himself fully to various aspects of biology and physics that had captivated him for some time. His most famous experiment, of course, was flying a kite with a key attached to its string, proving that lightning carries an electrical charge (1752). Franklin had by then already invented the lightning rod, which he primarily intended for use atop ships, not houses.
After he reached 40 years old, Franklin needed to wear glasses for reading as well as for everyday nearsightedness. In order to save himself the trouble of constantly switching between them, he cut the lenses in half horizontally, and joined the tops of his everyday lenses to the bottoms of his reading glasses, thereby inventing the world's first bifocal glasses.
Franklin also conceived the mid-room furnace, the "Franklin Stove." In those days rooms could only be heated with a fire in a fireplace, which by definition was set into a wall. Franklin knew that, since heat radiates from a fire in all directions, a fireplace was inefficient. So he built a cast-iron furnace that could be placed in the middle of a room. The heat it generated spread out in all directions, and was also absorbed by the furnace's iron walls, so that the stove provided warmth even after the fire went out.
However, Franklin's design was flawed, in that his furnace vented the smoke from its base: because the furnace lacked a chimney to "draw" fresh air up through the central chamber, the fire would soon go out. It took David R. Rittenhouse, another hero of early Philadelphia, to improve Franklin's design by adding an L-shaped exhaust pipe that drew air through the furnace and vented its smoke up and along the ceiling, then into an intramural chimney and out of the house.
Franklin's other inventions include an odometer and first known medical catheter. In addition, he first conceived a number of institutions, including the American Philosophical Society (1728), first American Fire Department (1736), and what became the University of Pennsylvania (1742). He was Philadelphia's first Postmaster General (1736), and of course played a major role in the formation of the United States of America. One of the last roles he played before his death at age 84 in 1790 was President of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery.
Benjamin Franklin was a true philosopher in the earliest sense of the word: interested in all aspects of the natural world, including mankind's place in it, he learned through his own experimentation and his conversation with those who shared his interests; and he showed little interest in patenting or profiting from the things he invented and discovered. Scientifically speaking, he may be the best role model that 21st-century American inventors could find.

Accidental or Serependitous discoveries

Serendip...WHAT?  The Kingdom of Serendip Once upon a time there was an oriental and exotic Kingdom called Serendip, the memory of which blends with imagination. Our elder tell us that it existed; that it was located in an island that many many years later was called Ceylon, today known as Sri Lanka. The exotic names of cities in that island, places like Trincomalee o Jaffna,  can easily make us believe that was the case. Or maybe Serendip was in Persia.
 

  I will tell you a particularly curious tale from that old Kingdom. It is the story of the Three Princes of  Serendip, three priviledged individuals not only gifted by their noble origin but also endowed with a unique talent: the gift of casual discovery. These three characters were able to find answers to questions or misteries they were not in search of. Thanks to their natural sagacity they would solve unexpected dilemmas.

 

  This unique ability must have impresed so deeply an anonymous witness that he decided to save it for history in the anonymous story entitled “The Three Princes of Serendip”. 

  Many many people read this book for many many years. But when Mr. Horace Walpole read it in the 18th century something changed. 

 

Walpole must have also found sublime the gift of the three princes, though quite difficult to describe, and invented to the effect an expresive little word:  “serendipity”.   Letters are a very valuable source of historical information. And the letter that Mr Walpole wrote to Sir Horace Mann on January 28, 1754  is one of those texts that make history. Not history of wars or empires, spies or conspirations, but word history. In that  letter Horace Walpole wrote about his recent creation, about the word serendipity and its expressive richness.

“. . . this discovery indeed is almost of that kind which I call serendipity, a very expressive word, which as I have nothing better to tell you, I shall endeavor to explain to you: you will understand it better by the derivation than by the definition. I once read a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip: as their highnesses travelled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of: for instance, one of them discovered that a mule blind of the right eye had travelled the same road lately, because the grass was eaten only on the left side, where it was worse than on the right--now do you understand serendipity?”

 The word “serendipity” is found today in English dictionaries- though only in those edited after 1974- and its meaning fits perfectly well the accidental nature of many scientific discoveries, made by chance, found without looking for them but possible only through a sharp vision and sagacity, ready to see the unexpected and never indulgent with the aparently unexplainable. The following are just a few examples of many serendipitous discoveries and inventions

Archymedes' Principle

 

The legend says he discovered it while taking a bath. Archymedes must have realized that his body was gradually weighing less as he was getting into the bath, while spilling the same volume of water. He was so thrilled that he ran naked out of the bath and into the streets yelling "Eureka!" (I found it).
 

The case of he jumping frog's leg.

 

“I had dissected and prepared a frog in the usual way and while I was attending to something else I laid it on a table on which stood an electrical machine at some distance from its conductor and separated from it by a considerable space. Now when one of the persons present touched accidentally and lightly the inner crural nerves of the frog with the point of a scalpel, all the muscles of the legs seemed to contract again and again as if they were affected by powerful cramps.”

This is Galvani's own description of his first and absolutely accidental observation of what he called "animal electricity". Instead of forgetting the incident he didn't stop until he could repeat it. Galvani's experiments set the basis for modern neurophysiology. Nerves were not the fluid-filled channels that the mind of Descartes had earlier imagined but electrical conductors. The first electric battery
Was designed by Alessandro Volta and reported in 1800 based on the serendipitous observations by Galvani. Volta wanted to demonstrate that the generation of electricity in Galvani's experiments was originated by the use of two different metals separated by an electrolytic solution.

Sticky "ma non tropo"

Not only some of the greatest scientific discoveries have serendipitous roots. Many little (but very profitable) technological contributions also fall within that category. The adhesive used in those very popular self-sticking "Post it" notes for example. That glue was not what their discoverers were looking for. In fact it was a lousy glue. Nevertheless, a keen reevaluation took it out of the failures drawer and after a certain period of optimization put it into the shrine of profitable innovations.
Do you know more examples of serendipitous discoveries?

Band Aid

Band-Aid is the trademarked name for bandages sold by the Johnson & Johnson Company.

Earle Dickson Invented the Band-Aid to Save Wife's Fingers

Earle Dickson was employed as a cotton buyer for the Johnson & Johnson when he invented the band-aid in 1921. His wife Josephine Dickson was always cutting her fingers in the kitchen while preparing food.

At that time a bandage consisted of separate gauze and adhesive tape that you would cut to size and apply yourself. Earle Dickson noticed that gauze and adhesive tape she used would soon fall off her active fingers. He decided to invent something that would stay in place and protect small wounds better.

Earle Dickson took a piece of gauze and attached it to the center of a piece of tape, and then covered the product with crinoline to keep it sterile. His boss, James Johnson, saw Earle Dickson's invention and decided to manufacture band-aids to the public and make Earle Dickson vice-president of Johnson & Johnson.

Band-Aids & Boy Scouts

Sales of Band-Aids were slow until Johnson & Johnson decided to give Boy Scout troops free Band-Aids as a publicity stunt. By 1924, Band-Aids were machine made, sold sterilized in 1939

Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1984

Niels K. Jerne

Georges J.F. Köhler

César Milstein

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1984 was awarded jointly to Niels K. Jerne, Georges J.F. Köhler and César Milstein "for theories concerning the specificity in development and control of the immune system and the discovery of the principle for production of monoclonal antibodies".

History of Lawn Mower.

The first patent for a mechanical lawn mower described as a "Machine for mowing lawns, etc." was granted on August 31, 1830 to engineer, Edwin Beard Budding (1795-1846) from Stroud, Gloucestershire, England.

Budding's design was based on a cutting tool used for the uniform trimming of carpet. It was reel-type mower that had a series of blades arranged around a cylinder. John Ferrabee owner of Phoenix Foundry at Thrupp Mill, Stroud, first produced the Budding lawn mowers. The first unpatented lawn mower was probaly built by Scotsmen, Alexander Shanks in 1841 - a 27 inch pony drawn reel lawn mower. 
The first United States patent for a real lawn mower was granted to Amariah Hills on January 12, 1868. Early lawn mowers were often designed to be horse drawn, the horses often wore oversize leather booties to prevent lawn damage. In 1870, Elwood McGuire of Richmond, Indiana designed a very popular human pushed lawn mower, not the first to be human pushed, however, McGuire's design was very lightweight and a commercial success.
Steam powered lawn mowers appeared in the 1890's. In 1902, Ransomes produced the first commercially available mower powered by an internal combustion gasoline engine. In the United States, gasoline powered lawn mowers were first manufactured in 1919 by Colonel Edwin George. 

Nobel Prize winners for Medicine and Physiology..!980

Baruj Benacerraf

Jean Dausset

George D. Snell

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1980 was awarded jointly to Baruj Benacerraf, Jean Dausset and George D. Snell "for their discoveries concerning genetically determined structures on the cell surface that regulate immunological reactions".