Karl Landsteiner

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Karl Landsteiner
Born(1868-06-14)14 June 1868
Baden bei Wien, Austria-Hungary
Died26 June 1943(1943-06-26) (aged 75)
New York City, US
Citizenship
  • Austria
  • United States (from 1929)[2]
Alma mater
Rh factor, discovery of poliovirus
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
  • Medicine
  • virology
Institutions
Signature

Karl Landsteiner

immunologist.[4]
He emigrated with his family to New York in 1923 at the age of fifty five for professional opportunities, working for the Rockefeller Institute.

He had distinguished the main

polio virus in 1909. He received the Aronson Prize in 1926. In 1930, he received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. He was posthumously awarded the Lasker Award in 1946, and has been described as the father of transfusion medicine.[5][6]

Early life and education

Landsteiner as a child

He was born into a

Jewish family. His father Leopold Landsteiner (1818–1875), a renowned Viennese journalist and editor-in-chief of Die Presse, died at age 56, when Karl was 6. The boy became very close to his mother Fanny (née Hess; 1837–1908). After graduating with the Matura exam from a Vienna secondary school, he took up the study of medicine at the University of Vienna. Landsteiner wrote his doctoral thesis in 1891. While still a student he published an essay on the influence of diets on the composition of blood.[3]

From 1891 to 1893, Landsteiner studied chemistry in

München, Eugen Bamberger and in Zürich under Arthur Rudolf Hantzsch. He had a number of publications from that period, some of them in co-operation with his professors.[7]

Research work in Vienna; discovery of the polio virus

Landsteiner in the lab

After returning to Vienna he became an assistant to

poliomyelitis and isolated the polio virus.[9] In recognition of this groundbreaking discovery, which proved to be the basis for the fight against polio, he was posthumously inducted into the Polio Hall of Fame at Warm Springs, Georgia
, which was dedicated in January 1958.

Research of the blood groups

In 1900 Landsteiner found out that the blood of two people under contact

blood serum. As a result, he succeeded in identifying the three blood groups A, B and O, which he labelled C, of human blood. Landsteiner also found out that blood transfusion between persons with the same blood group did not lead to the destruction of blood cells, whereas this occurred between persons of different blood groups.[10] Based on his findings, the first successful blood transfusion was performed by Reuben Ottenberg at Mount Sinai Hospital
in New York in 1907.

Karl Landsteiner depicted on a medal awarded by the Netherlands Red Cross

Today, whole blood transfusions are rare. It is now well known that persons with blood group AB can accept red blood cell donations of the other blood groups, and that persons with blood group O-negative can donate red blood cells to all other groups. Individuals with blood group AB are referred to as universal recipients and those with blood group O-negative are known as universal donors. These donor-recipient relationships arise due to the fact that type O-negative blood possesses neither antigens of blood group A nor of blood group B. Therefore, the immune systems of persons with blood group A, B or AB do not refuse the donation. Further, because persons with blood group AB do not form antibodies against either the antigens of blood group A or B, they can accept red blood cells from persons with these blood groups, as well as from persons with blood group O-negative.

In 1930 Landsteiner was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in recognition of these achievements. For his pioneering work, he is recognized as the father of transfusion medicine.[11]

Research work in the Netherlands and the United States

After World War I, Vienna and the new republic of Austria as a whole was in a desolate economic state, a situation in which Landsteiner did not see any possibilities to carry on with his research work. He decided to move to the Netherlands and accepted a post as prosector in the small Catholic St. Joannes de Deo hospital (now MCH Westeinde) in The Hague[12] and, in order to improve his financial situation also took a job in a small factory, producing old tuberculin (tuberculinum pristinum).[13] He also published a number of papers, five of them being published in Dutch by the Royal Academy of Sciences. Yet working conditions proved to be not much better than in post-war Vienna.

So Landsteiner accepted the invitation that reached him from New York, initiated by

paternity suits
.

Awards and honours

In addition to winning the

Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award. Since 2005, World Blood Donor Day
is celebrated on Landsteiner's birthday anniversary. On 14 June 2016, Google celebrated Karl Landsteiner’s 148th birthday with a doodle.[16][17]

Personal life

Landsteiner converted from

Greek Orthodox
woman who converted to her husband's Catholic faith.

In 1937, Landsteiner unsuccessfully[19] initiated legal action against an American publisher who had included him in the book Who's Who in American Jewry. Landsteiner said that "it will be detrimental to me to emphasize publicly the religion of my ancestors."[20]

See also

References

  1. ^
    S2CID 161789667
    .
  2. S2CID 36393411
    .
  3. ^ a b c "Karl Landsteiner". Nobel Lectures, Physiology or Medicine 1922–1941. Amsterdam: Elsevier Publishing Company. 1965. Retrieved 12 June 2018.
  4. ^ "Karl Landsteiner", Jewish Virtual Library
  5. ISBN 978-3-031-14528-5
    .
  6. PMID 4895093
    .
  7. ISBN 978-3-89412-084-9
    .
  8. ^ Speiser & Smekal 1990, p. 33.
  9. ^ Landsteiner, K.; Popper, E. (1909). "Übertragung der Poliomyelitis acuta auf Affen" [Transmission of Poliomyelitis acuta to monkeys]. Zeitschrift für Immunitätsforschung und experimentelle Therapie [Journal for Research on Immunity and Experimental Therapy] (in German). 2: 377–390.
  10. ^ Landsteiner, Karl (1900). "Zur Kenntnis der antifermentativen, lytischen und agglutinierenden Wirkungen des Blutserums und der Lymphe". Centralblatt für Bakteriologie, Parasitenkunde und Infektionskrankheiten. 27: 357–362.
  11. The Tribune
    . 15 June 2006. Retrieved 14 January 2012.
  12. ^ "Wie was Karl Landsteiner?" [Who was Karl Landsteiner?]. Landsteiner Instituut (in Dutch). Archived from the original on 16 December 2018. Retrieved 13 December 2018.
  13. ^ Speiser & Smekal 1990, p. 63.
  14. ^ "Karl Landsteiner". www.nasonline.org. Retrieved 6 June 2023.
  15. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 6 June 2023.
  16. ^ Desk, OV Digital (13 June 2023). "14 June: Remembering Karl Landsteiner on Birthday". Observer Voice. Retrieved 13 June 2023.
  17. ^ Karl Landsteiner's 148th birthday, retrieved 13 June 2023
  18. ISBN 978-3-631-55832-4
    , p. 349
  19. ^ "Concise Dictionary of American Jewish Biography". The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives.[page needed]
  20. ^ "Dr. Landsteiner Sues to Escape Being Labelled Jew". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. 6 April 1937.

External links

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