George Oliver (physician)

George Oliver ( born April 13, 1841 in Middleton -in- Teesdale, County Durham, † December 27 1915 in Farnham, Surrey ) was an English physician and 1893-1895 co-discoverer of the adrenal medulla hormone adrenaline and the neurohypophysial antidiuretic hormone.

Life

Oliver studied at University College London and medicine in 1873 for MD doctorate. From his teachers, especially the anatomist and physiologist William Sharpey impressed him ( 1802-1880 ). From 1875 to 1908 he worked as a resident doctor in Harrogate, a spa town in the county of North Yorkshire. The winter was spent mostly in London, where he took part in the activities of medical societies and even researched. In 1887 he became a member of the Royal College of Physicians. In 1901 he bought a house in Farnham, where he retired in 1908. With his wife, Alice, he had a son and a daughter. He was born in the nearby village of Farnham Tilford buried on 31 December 1915, the small church, " he had visited so regularly ."

Oliver experimented and wrote much. He constructed devices for measurement of hemoglobin in the blood, the blood pressure and the diameter of skin near arteries. A book " urine tests at the bedside " appeared in several editions; he developed to " Oliver's test strips ". Also a book "Blood pressure " through several editions. Among his discoveries he probably came out of the contemporary notion of a " body therapy", according to the organs efficacious substances contained, their therapeutic benefit it was to find out.

The discovery of adrenalin

Mainly with this discovery, 1893 /94, Oliver has enrolled in the medical and biological history. Co-discoverer was Edward Albert Schäfer (1850-1935), the William Sharpey had also impressed, which was from 1883 to 1899, in turn, physiology professor at University College London and in 1918 his family name " shepherd " the name " Sharpey " progress continued, so that he has since " Edward Albert Sharpey -Schafer, " sources said.

Henry Hallett Dale (1875-1968), who worked at the beginning of the 20th century at University College, some of the most important publications on adrenalin and its relatives with Otto Loewi in 1936 wrote and shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, announced the discovery in 1937 in a lecture in Edinburgh so the story (like all quotations from the original version):

" Dr. Oliver - so they told me - was a general practitioner with a talent for inventing simple apparatus for experiments on humans. So he wrote a tiny instrument with which one, he claimed, through the intact skin could measure the diameter of arteries such as the radial artery at the wrist. He seems to have experimented on his family. At a young son, he tested the effect of subcutaneous injection of extracts of animal glands. We have ... So imagine Professor Shepherd in the old Physiological Laboratory of University College, a shabby angle compared to our modern standards, as it stops the measurement of arterial blood pressure in an anesthetized dog. To him shall ... Dr. Oliver with the history of the tests on his son, especially that subcutaneous injection of a glycerol extract of bovine adrenal radial artery narrowed clearly. Professor Shepherd said to have been incredulous to have kept watching for a self-deception. I think ... we can not blame him; with everything we know today about the effect of the extract - who would believe that his subcutaneous injection narrowed the radial artery of a boy measurable? Dr. Oliver but is stubborn; the professor was but just in a cycle test of a dog, and at least it did not matter if he inject something intravenously from the adrenal extract. Professor Shepherd makes the injection in anticipation of a triumphant demonstration of nothing ( expecting a triumphant demonstration of nothing ) and must see - like an astronomer, when a new planet swims into his ken, as the mercury is rising rapidly to an unexpected height, almost from the peripheral leg out of the U-tube manometer. Thus, the active principle of the adrenal gland was discovered, the later recognized as an ingredient solely of the adrenal medulla and later purely represented crystalline and " epinephrine " or " adrenaline " was called. "

Dale told that in a " Sharpey -Schafer Memorial Lecture ", donated in memory of the co-discoverer of adrenaline. But as well known is the story repeated, for example, by Dale himself and in the monumental work " catechols and other sympathicomimetische amines " by Peter Holtz (1902-1970) and Dieter Palm (1924-2005), their veracity is not beyond doubt. Dale even said carefully, he reports what has been handed down in the University College, and wondered about the recognizability of a narrowing of the radial artery. Oliver's descendants, questioned, knew nothing of experiments on his son. Finally Dales contradicts multiple subcutaneous injections mention of the reports of the participants. Oliver himself wrote in 1895 in the publication of his first therapeutic trials: " During the winter of 1893/94, I examined with a self-designed instrument, the Arteriometer, fabrics, whether they changed the diameter of arteries. I found that oral administration ( administration by the mouth ) of glycerol extracts of the adrenal glands of cattle and sheep had a strong vasoconstrictor. " Similarly, Schäfer thirteen years later :" In the autumn of 1893, visited me in my laboratory at the University College an unknown to me, Lord, which introduced himself as Dr. George Oliver. He wanted to discuss with me the results of some experiments in which he had studied in humans the effect of extracts of animal organs, administered orally on the blood vessels, namely the two self-constructed instruments, a sphygmomanometer and a Arteriometer for the exact determination of the diameter radial artery or other superficial arteries. " effects of adrenaline after oral administration are highly unlikely. Some details of the famous discovery history are probably legend.

On March 10, 1894 Oliver and Schafer occurred at a meeting of the " Physiological Society " in London with their animals for the first time to the public: " The adrenal specify cold or hot water, alcohol or glycerine a substance from which the blood vessels, the heart and the skeletal muscles exerts a most powerful effect ... " the following year saw a 46seitiger essay in the style of the time without statistics, but with a precise representation of many individual experiments and 25 records on soot kymographs, for example, in addition to the increase in blood pressure document a reflex bradycardia and a contraction of the spleen. " It seems certain after these studies indicate that the adrenal glands, although secreting glands are without a duct. The material that they make and that in any case in its active form occurs only in Mark, exerts remarkable effects on muscle tissue, especially on the heart and arteries. It increases the tone of the muscle tissue, and that at least predominantly by a direct effect. " In 1895 appeared the above-mentioned first publication therapeutic trials that from today's perspective, in part, however, were hopeless when Oliver his preparations, for example, two patients with diabetes mellitus, a patient with diabetes insipidus and exophthalmos in a patient with Graves' disease was. However, Oliver Shepherd discovery was extremely important not only for basic research, the first identification of a hormone at all, but also for therapy. So successful drugs such as beta-blockers and β2 -adrenoceptor agonists go back on it.

The discovery of Adiuretins

Immediately on their 46seitigen article in the " Journal of Physiology " in 1895 were Oliver and Schaefer follow " Preliminary Communication". " Concurrent with our studies on the effects of adrenal extracts we have similar experiments with extracts of other glands carried out, especially the pituitary gland. " The pituitary increased blood pressure. This was the effect of the erstentdeckte Adiuretins, on account of which it is also called " vasopressin ".