| Fraunhofer, Joseph von | <person> German optician, 1787-1826. See: Fraunhofer's lines. (05 Mar 2000) |
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| Lieutaud, Joseph | <person> French anatomist and pathologist, 1703-1780. See: Lieutaud's body, Lieutaud's triangle, Lieutaud's trigone, Lieutaud's uvula. (05 Mar 2000) |
| Lister, Joseph | <person> Lister's surgical achievements certainly place him as the figurehead of English medicine. Born into a studious Quaker family in Upton, England, where his father was a wealthy wine merchant and also a maker of optical instruments, Joseph was influenced into scientific problems. While a medical student, he was encouraged in research, and later published two articles, the first on the dilator and sphincter muscles of the iris (enlarge and diminish the size of the pupil) and the second, describing the involuntary muscles (erector pillores) of the skin which elevated the hairs (and cause "goose bumps"). After graduating from the non-sectarian University of London Medical School, (called the Godless College) he became interested in microscopic anatomy, physiology, the mechanism of inflammation, and intravascular clotting. Lister migrated to Edinburgh, to visit the famous Syme's Clinic, married Agnes, the daughter of James Syme, Professor of Surgery, and six years later became Chief of Surgery at Glasgow. He experienced friends and dissenters throughout his life. Deeply impressed by the high incidence of mortality after amputations (45%), he insisted on rigid cleanliness. These were the times that "laudable pus" was necessary to heal wounds. Lister was firmly convinced that pus (purulency) was not necessary, but was actually detrimental to healing. He tried various antiseptic solutions (zinc chloride, bichloride of mercury, sulfites) to sterilise wounds and finally settled on carbolic acid spray (1865). His patients' mortality dropped dramatically. Lister soaked his silk and catgut sutures in carbolic acid, and used the same solution when he cleansed and dressed wounds frequently. Joseph Lister was called to Edinburgh to follow his father-in-law, Syme as professor. He was the first physician to sit in the House of Lords (1897). Upon his death this peer of the surgical world was buried in Westminster Abbey alongside his wife, and the entire guild of surgeons realised that the British island had laid to rest her greatest surgeon. Lived: 1827-1912. (18 Nov 1997) |
| Lister, Joseph Lord | <person> English surgeon, 1827-1912. See: Listerella, Listeria, listerism, Lister's dressing, Lister's method, Lister's tubercle. (05 Mar 2000) |
| Looney, Joseph | <person> U.S. Biochemist, *1896. See: Folin-Looney test. (05 Mar 2000) |