Marcello Malpighi
Marcello Malpighi | |
---|---|
Born | |
Died | 30 November 1694 | (aged 66)
Nationality | Italian |
Alma mater | University of Bologna |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Anatomy, histology, physiology, embryology, medicine |
Institutions | University of Bologna University of Pisa University of Messina |
Doctoral advisor | Giovanni Alfonso Borelli |
Doctoral students | Antonio Maria Valsalva |
Marcello Malpighi (10 March 1628 – 30 November 1694) was an
The use of the microscope enabled Malpighi to discover that
Because Malpighi had a wide knowledge of both plants and animals, he made contributions to the scientific study of both. The Royal Society of London published two volumes of his botanical and zoological works in 1675 and 1679. Another edition followed in 1687, and a supplementary volume in 1697. In his autobiography, Malpighi speaks of his Anatome Plantarum, decorated with the engravings of Robert White, as "the most elegant format in the whole literate world."[5]
His study of plants led him to conclude that plants had tubules similar to those he saw in insects like the silkworm (using his microscope, he probably saw the stomata, through which plants exchange carbon dioxide with oxygen). Malpighi observed that when a ring-like portion of bark was removed on a trunk a swelling occurred in the tissues above the ring, and he correctly interpreted this as growth stimulated by food coming down from the leaves, and being blocked above the ring.[6]
Early years
Malpighi was born on 10 March 1628 at
In 1656,
Career
In 1653, his father, mother, and grandmother being dead, Malpighi left his family villa and returned to the
Retiring from university life to his villa in the country near Bologna in 1663, he worked as a physician while continuing to conduct experiments on the plants and insects he found on his estate. There he made discoveries of the structure of plants which he published in his Observations. At the end of 1666, Malpighi was invited to return to the public academy at Messina, which he did in 1667. Although he accepted temporary chairs at the universities of Pisa and Messina, throughout his life he continuously returned to Bologna to practice medicine, a city that repaid him by erecting a monument in his memory after his death.[10]
As a physician, Malpighi's medical consultations with his patients, which were mostly those belonging to social elite classes, proved useful in better understanding the links between the human anatomy, disease pathology, and treatments for said diseases.[11] Furthermore, Malpighi conducted his consultations not only by bedside, but also by post, using letters to request and conduct them for various patients.[11] These letters served as social connections for the medical practices he performed, allowing his ideas to reach the public even in the face of criticism.[11] These connections that Malpighi created in his practice became even more widespread due to the fact that he practised in various countries. However, long distances complicated consults for some of his patients.[11] The manner in which Malpighi practised medicine also reveals that it was customary in his time for Italian patients to have multiple attending physicians as well as consulting physicians.[11] One of Malpighi's principles of medical practice was that he did not rely on anecdotes or experiences concerning remedies for various illnesses. Rather, he used his knowledge of human anatomy and disease pathology to practice what he denoted as "rational" medicine ("rational" medicine was in contrast to "empirics").[11] Malpighi did not abandon traditional substances or treatments, but he did not employ their use simply based on past experiences that did not draw from the nature of the underlying anatomy and disease process.[11] Specifically in his treatments, Malpighi's goal was to reset fluid imbalances by coaxing the body to correct them on its own. For example, fluid imbalances should be fixed over time by urination and not by artificial methods such as purgatives and vesicants.[11] In addition to Malpighi's "rational" approaches, he also believed in so-called "miraculous," or "supernatural" healing. For this to occur, though, he argued that the body could not have attempted to expel any malignant matter, such as vomit. Cases in which this did occur, when healing could not be considered miraculous, were known as "crises."[12]
In 1668, Malpighi received a letter from Mr. Oldenburg of the Royal Society in London, inviting him to correspond. Malpighi wrote his history of the
Marcello Malpighi is buried in the church of Santi Gregorio e Siro, in Bologna, where nowadays can be seen a marble monument to the scientist with an inscription in Latin remembering – among other things – his "SUMMUM INGENIUM / INTEGERRIMAM VITAM / FORTEM STRENUAMQUE MENTEM / AUDACEM SALUTARIS ARTIS AMOREM" (great genius, honest life, strong and tough mind, daring love for the medical art).
Research
Around the age of 38, and with a remarkable academic career behind him, Malpighi decided to dedicate his free time to anatomical studies.
Although a Dutch spectacle maker created the compound lens and inserted it in a microscope around the turn of the 17th century, and
In 1661, Malpighi observed capillary structures in frog lungs.[14] Malpighi's first attempt at examining circulation in the lungs was in September 1660, with the dissection of sheep and other mammals where he would inject black ink into the pulmonary artery.[15] Tracing the inks distribution through the artery to the veins in the animal's lungs however, the chosen sheep/mammal's large size was limiting for his observation of capillaries as they were too small for magnification.[16] Malpighi's frog dissection in 1661, proved to be a suitable size that could be magnified to display the capillary network not seen in the larger animals.[16] In discovering and observing the capillaries in the frog's lungs, Malpighi studied the movement of the blood in a contained system.[15] This contrasted the previous view of an open circulatory system in which blood would come from the liver/spleen and pool into open spaces in the body.[15] This discovery of capillaries also contributed to William Harvey's theory of blood circulation, with capillaries acting as the connection from veins to arteries and confirming a closed system of circulation in animals.[17]
Furthering his analysis of the lungs, Malpighi identified the airways branched into thin membraned spherical cavities which he likened to honeycomb holes surrounded by capillary vessels, in his 1661 work "De pulmonibus observationes anatomicae".[18] These lung structures now known as alveoli he used to describe the air pathway as continuous inhalation and exhalation with the alveoli at the ends of the pathway acting as a "imperfect sponge" for the air to enter the body.[16] Extrapolating to humans, he offered an explanation for how air and blood mix in the lungs.[13] Malpighi also used the microscope for his studies of the skin, kidneys, and liver. For example, after he dissected a black male, Malpighi made some groundbreaking headway into the discovery of the origin of black skin. He found that the black pigment was associated with a layer of mucus just beneath the skin.[citation needed]
In the years 1663–1667, at the University of Messina where his research focus was on studying the human nervous system where he identified and described nerve endings in the body, structure of the brain, and optic nerve.[17] All of his work in 1665 surrounding the nervous system he published in 3 separate works published in the same year titled, De Lingua about taste and the tongue, De Cerebro about the brain and De Externo Tactus Organo about feeling/touch sensation.[17] In regards to his work on the tongue he discovered small muscle bumps, taste buds, which he called "papillae" and when examining them he described a linked connection to nerve endings that gave the taste sensation when eating.[19] Furthermore, in 1686 through studying a bovine tongue Malpighi dividing the tongue papillae into separate "patches" on the tongues length.[19] When studying the brain, he was one of the first to try to map the grey and white tissue and hypothesized a connection between the brain and spinal cord through nerve endings.[20]
Malpighi's work on plant anatomy was inspired in Messina when visiting his patron Visconte Ruffo's garden where a chestnut tree's split branch had a structure that intrigued him, this structure in modern literature being xylem.[16] He examined the structure in different plans and noted the arrangement of xylem was in either a ring shape or in scattered groupings in the stem.[16] This distinction was later used by biologists to separate the two major families of plants.[16]
A talented sketch artist, Malpighi seems to have been the first author to have made detailed drawings of individual organs of flowers. In his Anatome plantarum is a longitudinal section of a flower of Nigella (his Melanthi, literally honey-flower) with details of the nectariferous organs. He adds that it is strange that nature has produced on the leaves of the flower shell-like organs in which honey is produced.[21]
Malpighi had success in tracing the
Because Malpighi was concerned with teratology (the scientific study of the visible conditions caused by the interruption or alteration of normal development) he expressed grave misgivings about the view of his contemporaries that the galls of trees and herbs gave birth to insects. He conjectured (correctly) that the creatures in question arose from eggs previously laid in the plant tissue.[5]
Malpighi's investigations of the lifecycle of plants and animals led him to the topic of reproduction. He created detailed drawings of his studies of chick embryo development, starting from 2–3 days after fertilization with these drawings of embryos having a focus on the developmental timing of the limbs and organs.[22] Additionally, seed development in plants (such as the lemon tree), and the transformation of caterpillars into insects. Malpighi also postulated about the embryotic growth of humans, written in a letter to Girolamo Correr, a patron of scientists, Malphighi suggested that all the components of the circulatory system would have been developed at the same time in embryo.[22] His discoveries helped to illuminate philosophical arguments surrounding the topics of emboîtment, pre-existence, preformation, epigenesis, and metamorphosis.[23]
Years in Rome
In 1691 Pope Innocent XII invited him to Rome as papal physician. He taught medicine in the Papal Medical School and wrote a long treatise about his studies which he donated to the Royal Society of London.
Marcello Malpighi died of apoplexy (an old-fashioned term for a stroke or stroke-like symptoms) in Rome on 30 November 1694, at the age of 66.[7] In accordance with his wishes, an autopsy was performed. The Royal Society published his studies in 1696. Asteroid 11121 Malpighi is named in his honour.
Some of Malpighi's important works
- Anatome Plantarum, two volumes published in 1675 and 1679, an exhaustive study of botany published by the Royal Society
- De viscerum structura exercitatio
- De pulmonis epistolae
- De polypo cordis, 1666
- Dissertatio epistolica de formatione pulli in ovo, 1673
References
- ^ Malpighi's De polypo cordis dissertatio (Treatise on cardiac polyp) was included as a chapter of his De viscerum structura exercitatio anatomica (Essay on the anatomical structure of the viscera, 1666).
- Malpighi, Marcello (1666). De Viscerum Structura Exercitatio Anatomica [Essay on the anatomical structure of the viscera] (in Latin). Bologna, (Italy): Giacomo Monti. pp. 151–172.
- English translation: Forrester, John M. (October 1995). "Malpighi's De polypo cordis: an annotated translation". Medical History. 39 (4): 477–492. PMID 8558994.
- ISBN 978-0226136783.
- ISBN 978-0810997981.
- ISBN 978-3805564991.
- ^ S2CID 143008947.
- ISBN 978-0801899041.
- ^ a b Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 17 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 497.
- Bibcode:1927SciMo..25..546S.
- PMID 33944166.
- ^ ISBN 0226669548. pp. 22–25
- ^ S2CID 11462101.
- S2CID 161081155.
- ^ S2CID 143696615.
- ISBN 0-691-02350-6.
- ^ PMID 6375074.
- ^ S2CID 7611397.
- ^ .
- S2CID 149443383.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-118-97175-8.
- S2CID 39575356.
- S2CID 144205554.
- ^ PMID 9556019.
- S2CID 37862050.
Bibliography
- Adelmann, Howard (1966) Marcello Malpighi and the Evolution of Embryology 5 vol., Cornell University Press, Ithaca, N.Y. OCLC 306783
- Malpighi, Marcello (1685). De Externo Tactus Organo Anatomica Observatio. Naples: Aegidium Longum.
- Malpighi, Marcello (1675). Anatome plantarum: Cui subjungitur appendix, iteratas & auctas ejusdem authoris de ovo incubato observationes continens (in Latin). London: Johannis Martyn. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
- Malpighi, Marcello (1679). Anatome plantarum: Pars altera (in Latin). London: Johannis Martyn. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
- Malpighi, Marcello (2008). Redfern, Margaret; Cameron, Alexander J.; Down, Kevin (eds.). De Gallis – On Galls. ISBN 9780903874410.
External links
- Some places and memories related to Marcello Malpighi
- Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. .