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42nd APS President (1969-1970)
C. Ladd Prosser
(1907-2002)
Writing of his service on Council and in presidential offices of APS,
Prosser recalled many rewarding experiences association with high-quality
physiologists, Washington contacts, and successes of both the publication
and the education programs. At the same time he reported that a prominent
recollection is one of "frustration."
"Before I was a member of Council, I was appointed to the first Education
Committee, organized in 1953 under the chairmanship of Edward Adolph. The
third member was William Amberson. At this time Milton Lee was turning the
executive secretaryship over to Ray Daggs, who strongly supported
educational activities. My own effort was to strengthen teaching of
physiology to undergraduates. We obtained funds to organize summer workshops
for college teachers. I directed the first, at the University of Connecticut
at Storrs, where twenty teachers heard from several research physiologists
and discussed laboratory experiments. We started to assemble a laboratory
manual under the supervision of Louise Wilson of Wellesley College. Because
the college teachers wanted to do research in which their undergraduate
seniors could participate, we obtained a grant from NIH to APS for a program
under which a college teacher might obtain up to $500 annually. Applications
were evaluated by the Education Committee, supplemented by ad hoc reviewers.
The program went well for several years, until the bureaucrats at the NIH
decided not to make grants which finally would be allocated by a non-NIH
committee. The program died . . . . Frustration..."
"Another continuing interest of mine was the establishment of APS as a
parent organization for all areas of physiology not just for those of
interest to medical physiologists. In the mid-1950s the biophysicists formed
their own society, and the Society of General Physiologists was founded,
largely by the Woods Hole group. At about this same time, for the American
Society of Zoologists, I served on a committee that led to creation of some
six semi-autonomous divisions of the society, each of which was permitted to
expand according to membership need. One of the growing divisions was
comparative physiology. Because its members wanted a publication, I tried to
strengthen the section of comparative physiology in the American Journal
of Physiology, which had become simply a catch-all for papers without
obvious medical orientation. A proposal that this journal section be
sponsored by the Division of Comparative Physiology of the American Society
of Zoologists was rejected by Council. . . ."
"As president of APS, I pursued the constitutional changes needed for
sectionalization of the Society along the lines of the American Society of
Zoologists. Neurophysiologists were then threatening to form a society, and
I did not want to see this large area of physiology become independent of
APS. After extensive debate, Council decided to put the question of
sectionalization to a vote at the Spring Business Meeting. When the vote
went against my recommendation as president, I was genuinely disappointed."
"Now, some fifteen years later, the Society has established sections that
may help prevent further fragmentation of the APS. Meanwhile, we did manage
to add representatives from general and from comparative physiology to the
American Committee for IUPS and the international congresses. In hindsight,
it probably was best that the biophysicists, the general, and then the
comparative and the neurophysiologists did form separate societies. Each has
become scientifically strong. I believe, however, that there remains a need
for a parent organization that can represent all of physiology in Washington
and to the public and also can strengthen teaching and recruitment at all
levels. . . . Moreover the upgrading of education for the Ph.D. degree in
physiology requires a continuous and united action by members of all these
societies."
Ladd Prosser was born in Avon, New York, and earned his A.B. degree at
the University of Rochester (1929), followed by the Ph.D. degree from Johns
Hopkins University (1932). For two years he was a Parker Fellow, first at
Harvard University Medical School and then at Cambridge University, England.
He was a member of the faculty of Clark University in Worcester,
Massachusetts (1934-37), until he joined the Department of Physiology of the
University of Illinois in Urbana as an assistant professor (1937). By 1949
he was a professor there; from 1960 to 1969 he was head of the department,
and in 1975 he became professor emeritus without perceptible change in his
academic or scientific life.
Prosser's research interests encompass a variety of comparative fields.
He wrote:
"My interest in the nervous systems of invertebrates was initiated in 1927
by Herrick's book, Neurological Basis of Behavior. I learned general
physiology from S O. Mast at Johns Hopkins and electrophysiology at Harvard,
principally from Hallowell Davis. In England, I learned much from E. D.
Adrian and J. C. Eccles. My first job was at Clark University where Hudson
Hoagland introduced me to academic politics. During World War II, I was
active in radiation biology and biophysics as Associate Section Chief for
Biology at the Metallurgical Laboratory of the Manhattan Project, with K. S.
Cole as my section chief. Before the war and afterwards, contacts at Woods
Hole in the Marine Biological Laboratory were important to me."
Topics that have been of greatest interest to Prosser include 1)
nervous system of invertebrate animals; 2) comparative physiology of
muscles; 3) theory of physiological adaptation; 4) temperature
adaptation, both metabolic and neural, mostly in fishes; 5) the
mechanism of rhythmicity in intestinal muscle; and 6) electrical
properties of smooth muscle. Representative papers on these problems are
included in the bibliography that follows. His complete bibliography
includes summarizing articles on comparative physiology of nerve systems and
sense organs (Annu. Rev. Physiol., 1954), physiological variation in
animals (, 1955), theoretical aspects of adaptation (Handbook
of Physiology, 1968), smooth muscle (Annu.. Rev. Physiol., 1974),
temperature compensation in poikilotherms (Physiol. Rev., 1974), slow
rhythmic activity in gastrointestinal muscles (9), and evolution and
diversity of nonstriated muscle (13). Prosser noted:
"The series of papers on rhythmic activity in intestinal muscle has
established the concept of rhythmic electrogenic sodium pump and has
contributed to understanding of intercellular conduction in smooth muscle
(5-11). . . . Recently a series of papers examines mechanisms of
compensatory acclimation of fishes to heat and cold (cf. refs. 8 and 12).
One aspect of these mechanisms deals with changes in activities of
energy-yielding enzymes, with explanations in terms of protein synthesis.
Another aspect deals with changes in membrane phospholipids. Adaptations in
behavior and the central nervous concomitants include synaptic failure as
the most sensitive effect of temperature stress."
Prosser has enjoyed a more varied career than many of his contemporaries.
He served at various times as visiting professor at the Universities of
Washington, Stanford, Massachusetts, Arizona State, and Hawaii. In 1950,
after many years of summer research at the Marine Biological Laboratory in
Woods Hole, he was elected a trustee of that laboratory. For a year
(1963-64) he was a Guggenheim Fellow at the University of Munich, and later
(1971-72) he was International Exchange Fellow at Monash University in
Australia. When he took office as president elect of APS (1968) he had
already served as president of the Society of General Physiologists
(1958-59) and the American Society of Zoologists (1961). In 1957 Prosser
became a fellow of AAAS (Boston) and in 1974 was chosen for membership in
NAS. He received the honorary degree of doctor of science from Clark
University in 1975. He is a foreign associate of the Bavarian Academy of
Sciences.
Elected to APS in 1935, Prosser's first committee assignment was as a
member of the Education Committee (1953-59). At about the time of his
election to Council in 1967, he became active in the service of APS
publications, as a member of the Handbook Committee (1967-72), section
coeditor for comparative and general physiology of the American Journal
of Physiology (1968-71), and section editor for muscle physiology
(1970-71). More recently he was a member of the Senior Physiologists
Committee (1978-81). In 1983 he was the recipient of the Society's Ray G.
Daggs Award.
As a champion of the importance of comparative physiology, Prosser has
represented this discipline on numerous editorial boards and committees.
These include the American Journal of Physiology, the Journal of
Comparative Physiology, Digestive Disease, and Science. From 1975
he has been co-managing editor of Physiological Zoology. Perhaps his
most important work as author and editor, however, is the monograph and
textbook, Comparative Animal Physiology, published in 1951 and
revised in 1961 and 1973 (3). It has been translated into three foreign
languages, including Russian, and has been a major factor in establishing
comparative physiology as an independent discipline both in theory and
practice.
In commenting on his association with APS, Prosser noted other
significant events that came to pass. These included completion of the Lee
Building, which permitted expanding the scope of the Society's publications.
He also took part in debates over how strongly APS should support the AIBS
and how generously NIH should support training programs. Finally, when Ray
Daggs was about to retire from his office, Prosser proposed Orr Reynolds for
the position and saw his nomination safely through confirmation by Council.
Ladd concluded his recollections of his involvement with the Society with
these words:
"The future of APS is again being debated. I urge my young colleagues not
to lose sight of the breadth of the subject. The functional organization of
living organisms continues to provide inspiration to all who appreciate the
beauty of biological function and who recognize that we can better
understand humans by studying physiology of all sorts of organisms at
molecular, cellular, and organismic levels."
"Inspiration" in place of "frustration"!
Selected Publications
1. Prosser, C. L. Action potentials in the nervous system of the
crayfish. I. Spontaneous impulses. J. Cell. Comp. Physiol. 4:
185-209, 1934.
2. Prosser, C. L. An analysis of the action of acetylcholine on hearts,
particularly in arthropods. Biol. Bull. Woods Hole 83: 145-164, 1942.
3. Prosser, C. L., F. A. Brown, D. W. Bishop, T. L. Jahn, and V. J. Wulff.
Comparative Animal Physiology. Philadelphia, PA: Saunders, 1951.
[Prosser was general editor and author of 13 of the 23 chapters.]
4. Prosser, C. L., C. E. Smith, and C. E. Melton. Conduction of action
potentials in the ureter of the rat. Am. J. Physiol. 181: 651-660,
1955.
5. Kobayashi, M., T. Nagai, and C. L. Prosser. Electrical interaction
between muscle layers of cat intestine. Am. J. Physiol. 211:
1281-1291, 1966.
6. Papasova, M., T. Nagai, and C. L. Prosser. Two-component slow waves in
smooth muscle of cat stomach. Am. J. Physiol. 214: 695-702, 1968.
7. Prosser, C. L., and H. Ohkawa. Functions of neurons in enteric
plexuses of cat intestine. Am. J. Physiol. 222: 1420-1426, 1972.
8. Hazel, J. R., and C. L. Prosser. Molecular mechanisms of temperature
compensation in poikilotherms. Physiol. Rev. 54: 620-677, 1974.
9. Prosser, C. L., J. A. Connor, and W. A. Weems. Types of slow rhythmic
activity in gastrointestinal muscles. In: Physiology of Smooth Muscle,
edited by E. Bulbring and M. F. Shuba. New York: Raven, 1976, p. 99-109.
10. Prosser, C. L., J. A. Connor, and D. L. Kreulen. Interaction between
longitudinal and circular muscle in intestine of cat. J. Physiol. Lond.
273: 665-689, 1977.
11. Mangel, A. W., D. O. Nelson, J. A. Connor, and C. L. Prosser.
Contractions of cat small intestinal smooth muscle in calcium-free solution.
Nature Lond. 281: 582-583, 1979.
12. Nelson, D. O., and C. L. Prosser. Temperature-sensitive neurons in
the preoptic region of sunfish. Am. J. Physiol. 241 (Regulatory
Integrative Comp. Physiol. 10): R259- R263, 1979.
13. Prosser, C. L. Evolution and diversity of nonstriated muscles. In:
Handbook of Physiology. Vascular Smooth Muscle, edited by D. F. Bohr, A.
P. Somlyo, and H. V. Sparks, Jr. Bethesda, MD: Am. Physiol. Soc., 1980,
sect. 2, vol. II, chapt. 21, p. 635-670.
14. Prosser, C. L., and D. O. Nelson. The role of nervous system in
temperature adaptation of poikilotherms. Annu. Rev. Physiol. 43:
281-300, 1981.
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