Nobel Prize Award for Physiology and Medicine 1926 to 1933

About the Nobel Prize Award for Physiology and Medicine from 1926 to 1933 including the scientists Von Jauregg and Morgan, their works, and history.

PHYSIOLOGY AND MEDICINE

1926 Johannes A. G. Fibiger (1867-1928), Danish

Work: Isolated "spiroptera carcinoma," a type of cancer, and developed a process for artificially inducing cancer in laboratory animals

1927 Julius Wagner von Jauregg (1857-1940), Austrian

Work: Developed a malaria-based vaccine as a cure for some forms of paralysis

Nobel Laureate: Born in Upper Austria, Dr. Wagner von Jauregg early in his career climbed to the mountain settlements of southeastern Austria, where endemic thyroid malfunctions had produced a rash of goiters and cretinism. These he treated with doses of thyroid extract. The mental effects of syphilis began to attract his attention in 1887. Puzzled by the sudden recovery of paralytics following a bout of high fever, he reasoned that an artifically induced fever might also restore motion to limbs long left limp. He prepared batches of various bacteria, but none, when injected, simulated precisely enough the natural fever which had cured paralysis automatically. Then he introduced malarial fever, carefully controlled with quinine, in subjects, and it worked. Rising body temperatures drove the syphilis microbe from the brain. Most patients improved. From 1893 to 1928, Wagner von Jauregg served as professor at the University of Vienna and ran the psychiatric clinic there.

1928 Charles J. H. Nicolle (1866-1936), French

Work: Research on typhus

1929 Christiaan Eijkman (1858-1930), Dutch

Work: Discovery of vitamin B1

Frederick G Hopkins (1861-1947), British, British

Work: Discovery of vitamin A

1930 Karl Landsteiner (1868-1943), American (b. Austria)

Work: Discovery of the human blood groups, paving the way for blood transfusions

1931 Otto H. Warburg (1883-1970), German

Work: Discovered the nature of the respiratory enzyme

1932 Edgar D. Adrian (1889- ), British

Work: Discovered the nature of the neuron and its role in the nervous system

1933 Thomas H. Morgan (1866-1945), American

Work: Discovered the gene mechanism of heredity

Nobel Laureate: Morgan joined the faculty of Bryn Mawr as a biology professor in 1891. Three years later he was appointed professor of experimental zoology at Columbia University. At Bryn Mawr he had begun challenging accepted theories in embryology, but at Columbia he shifted his attention to the obscure workings of heredity. Somewhat impatient, he chose fruit flies as subjects, mainly because an entire generation rose every 10 days. Through an elaborate, carefully controlled set of experiments, the fly squad, as his group came to be called, not only proved the existence of genes within chromosomes but also discovered their arrangement, the difference between the genes of men and women, how genes get together, and the origin of gene mutation. Morgan proved that unexpected hereditary characteristics are sometimes caused by chromosomes which wrap around each other so tightly during meiosis that they break off and regroup imperfectly. This "crossover" theory and other Morgan discoveries revolutionized genetics. From 1928 Morgan headed up the newly created Kerckhoff Laboratories of Biological Sciences at Caltech in Pasadena, where he died.

Nobel Lore: Morgan was the first native-born American and the first nonphysician to be awarded the prize in physiology and medicine.