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Letter to Virenda Mahesh
Kenneth A. Hubel writes:
“When I opened your note I was startled to realize that 10 years had passed
since I responded to Dick Malvin’s similar inquiry when I turned 70. In the
final paragraph of that response I wrote:
‘I will retire in January 1998, having had the pleasures of discovering a
few new facts of some importance, and of having worked with good people for
commendable goals in a stimulating setting where we shared an honorable
ethic.’ Memories of that career and those good people provide rich and
continuing pleasure.
“For a couple of years I helped tutor second-year medical students at the
University of Iowa in the arts of eliciting a clinical history and of
performing a physical examination but since then I have used my clinical
skills only at the Iowa City Free Medical Clinic. There we are not pressed
by administrators to sacrifice needed time with patients on the altar of
‘efficiency.’ The medical students who see the patients are bright and I’m
delighted to show them how to detect an enlarged spleen or evaluate the
cause of abdominal pain. And I correct them if they put the stethoscope on
the shirt instead of the skin. An occasional review of electrolyte
transport catches my eye if the author’s name is familiar but the list of
familiar names is getting shorter.
“I completed an autobiography for my family and had 30 copies printed in
2004. Copies of letters that I wrote to family and friends for 40 years
restored many memories as did 20,000 Kodachrome slides (for which the text
also serves as an index). The slides and a scanner also provide grist for
the Photoshop mill whose myriad adjustments I have barely tapped. I play
alto sax with a senior center ‘swing band’ and with a local professional
band. My wife, Jan, and I have bicycled from southern Illinois to Yorktown,
VA, on the North and South Islands of New Zealand, in Holland and Belgium,
northern Italy and southern France. In August we tested our cardiac reserve
by climbing over Beartooth Pass in Montana, and thereafter coasted for 100
minutes into Red Lodge. We still ski in Colorado a couple of weeks in
January and we look forward to biking in the Finger Lakes region in New York
on the way to my wife’s 50th reunion at Syracuse. We are blessed to have
two daughters and their families nearby, a great community and an old
English sheep dog.
“I serve on the board of the Council for International Visitors to Iowa
Cities. American embassies around the world select potential national
leaders for educational visits of three weeks to various American cities.
In recent years they have been selected chiefly from Muslim countries. We
have the pleasure of providing those visitors warm hospitality and candid
opinions in a small Midwest city with a large university. We hope to alter
their adverse opinions of the US so often formed by our television and
cinema and the arrogant foreign policies of the current presidential
administration. ‘Tis better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.’
“We would delight in hearing from friends if they are passing through.”
Letters to Julio Cruz
Toshio Narahashi writes: “I apologize for not writing you sooner, but
I have been swamped with several grant proposals to be submitted in time.
Thank you for sending me a card for my 80th birthday. It was very kind of
you. I am still working full time!
“I have been using electrophysiological approaches and am proud of being a
member of APS for many years. However, since my research subjects have
something to do with interactions of chemicals with neuroreceptors and ion
channels, I usually attend the annual meetings of the Society for
Neuroscience and the Society of Toxicology, plus a few symposia every year
leaving little time to attend the APS meeting. I feel I left ‘my heart in
APS.’
“I would like to take advantage of this column to let my friends know what I
have been doing recently. If I make any smallest contributions to science,
they may be classified into two: one for the mechanism of action of
insecticides on neuroreceptors and ion channels, which I started at the
University of Tokyo almost 60 years ago; and the other for the mechanism of
action of various therapeutic drugs and natural toxins (such as tetrodotoxin)
on neuroreceptors and channels, which were commenced mostly after moving to
the US some 45 years ago.
“One of the exciting findings was to count the number of sodium channels
needed to be modified for the insecticide pyrethroid to cause
hyperexcitation in animals. When one out of 100 channels is modified from
the normal short opening (2-3 msec) to long opening (up to a few seconds),
animal develops hyperexcitation, explaining why pyrethroid is so potent. I
believe this is an important concept in neuropharmacology as it is
applicable to the agents that ‘inhibit’ hyperexcitation (e.g., antiepileptic
drugs).
“The therapeutic drugs we have been working on during the past 10-20 years
include alcohol (therapeutic?) and Alzheimer’s drugs. Their mechanisms of
action are so complex that I cannot even summarize here. Interested readers
may check my publications in internet. Fortunately, Narahashi is a rare name
even in Japan, and most of the ~350 papers listed in internet under
Narahashi are my papers.
“Although many things still remain to be studied along these lines, I am now
moving (at least trying) to a new (for me) area, i.e., ‘microglia.’
Microglia represent a very exciting field as they are directly related not
only to physiology but also to pharmacology, toxicology, and pathophysiology
(such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s). It may sound crazy as someone in my
age is going to undertake a new field, but I would like to think forward
rather than backward. I will have to secure a grant or two to get this study
started, though. Incidentally, money is not a special topic these days: 40
years ago it was not a topic because money was plenty; it is not a topic
these days either because everybody is trying to get it.
“I will certainly keep in touch with you through this column or otherwise,
and would like to report my progress, if any, on ‘microglia’ study.”
Carlton F. Hazlewood writes: “It is a pleasure to correspond with you
as my 71st birth date approaches. Your request that I write a bit about my
career has prompted considerable reflection. When I was a graduate student
at the University of Tennessee Medical Units at Memphis, my dissertation
work addressed the problem of quantitatively defining progressive changes in
the inorganic matter (ions and water) of skeletal muscles of strain 129
mice—a very new animal model, at that time, for muscular dystrophy. I
slowly became fluent in cellular physiology and came to understand the
history and implications of the Ionic basis of electrical activity in muscle
and nerve physiology. In this process, I ‘wore out’ three major professors,
as I chose, and was approved, to pursue this project independently. I had
some wonderfully clever professors at UT Medical Units at Memphis, and I
ended up in a division of clinical physiology—in those days a new and
practical creation. Hence, I had ever-present in my mind to understand
physiology as it relates to the ‘bedside.’ This work was interrupted, when
I was accepted for postdoctoral studies in the department of medicine at The
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where I was to obtain insight
into the mechanism of action of insulin. My mentor, Kenneth L. Zierler, MD,
was (and is today) extraordinary. There, with his help, I improved my skill
in measuring cellular potentials and was allowed to ‘sneak in’ studies of
the electrolyte composition of developing skeletal muscle in the rat. Wow!
I found that, in the rats’ early postnatal life, the concentration of muscle
sodium exceeds that of potassium—a theoretical impossibility, if one clings
to conventional wisdom yet the muscles did not know that. What an exciting
moment! That moment ‘hooked’ me and the thrust of my academic career was
determined. My faculty appointment with Baylor College of Medicine commenced
in July of 1964. It began with funding from the Muscular Dystrophy
Associations of America to continue the systematic studies of the inorganic
(ions and water) matter changes in skeletal muscles of the postnatal rat.
The data I accumulated continued to fill me with excitement and concern. It
was becoming next to impossible to explain the findings in the conventional
way.
“Within six months after my having said so in the first major publication of
the findings, I was told my funding was terminated ‘…in order to make more
money available for younger researchers.’ A quick check of the published
records, showed that two of the ‘younger researchers’ were 1) my mentor at
Hopkins and 2) a Nobel Laureate—then retired. These were exciting times,
because our findings could be explained by two theories that differed in the
assumptions made about the physical properties of Ions and water within
cells. Proponents of conventional wisdom had stated that water is water is
water! The proponents of our view had demonstrated that the physical state
of water in biological systems varies with the physiological and
pathophysiological states of the tissues. The latter discovery has been
corroborated in many studies, including some that served as a test of the
seemingly preposterous idea that the human body could be imaged by capturing
the physical properties of water in space and time. We now know this
technology as magnetic resonance Imaging (MRI). (Needless to say, these
fundamental enquiries into the physical sate of water and ions in living
cells involved much fruitful collaboration. Primary among these were my
associations with Harold E. Rorschach, Gilbert N. Ling, James S. Clegg,
William Negendank, Miklós Kellermayer, Raymond V. Damadian, Walter Drost-Hansen,
Buford Nichols, and many, many more. Then, there were also a number of
students and postdocs from around the world.) In the early 1980s my work
with inorganic matter came to the attention of The United Nations
Educational, Scientific, and Cultural organization (UNESCO), and I was
invited to join the Expert Committee on Molecular and Cell Biophysics for
the Scientific Cooperation Bureau for the European and North American
Region, on which I served from 1983 to 1988. From 1985 to 1988 I served as
co-chairman (with Professor Vasilescu, Institute of Biophysics, Bucharest,
Romania) of Project 3: The Role of Water and Ions in Molecular and Cell
Biophysics. This was a lot of fun: we made numerous life-long friends,
helped exchange ideas with scientists in the former Soviet Union and Eastern
Europe, and, in some cases, helped keep science alive in some parts of the
world in a difficult time during, and toward the end of, the Cold War. In
sum, we found harmony in a multitude of cultures.
“You asked that I consider stating what I have learned and what I might wish
to pass on to the younger generations of physiologists. The following is my
attempt to do that. First, from time to time we believe we understand
certain phenomena that occur in our universe. A large majority, in fact, may
perceive this understanding as truth. Indeed, this perceived truth
sometimes evolves into dogma. As Fleck pointed out: ‘Once a structurally
complete and closed system of opinions consisting of many details and
relations has been formed, it offers enduring resistance to anything that
contradicts it,’ (Fleck, L. (1979) Genesis and Development of a Fact. Ed.
by T. J. Trenn and R. K. Merton. Translated by F. Bradley and T. J. Trenn. The
University of Chicago Press, Chicago). During the lifetime of such dogma,
much useful and even crucial information from the past and present may be
lost, forgotten, overlooked, or ignored. Information inconsistent with dogma
is likely to be overlooked or dismissed because it is perceived to be a
spurious observation inconsistent with (or irrelevant to) the popular
paradigm of the time. When new ideas are ‘born’ and are associated with
compelling new data, these ideas scream for a new synthesis of all data (old
and new), yet the old ideas often remain. In most cultures throughout
history, it is my observation that old ideas persist long after sound
evidence dictates otherwise.
“Second, when new and exciting findings are reported, and, particularly,
when these findings conflict with conventional wisdom, they are often
referred to as controversial or are even ‘overlooked’ and/or suppressed.
This seems to be a ubiquitous phenomenon across disciplines. In science,
this is expected and should be anticipated. For example, because of an
accumulated knowledge base (containing numerous implicit and explicit
assumptions), we think we ‘know’ that certain results are not possible.
Thus, to consider them possible is, at best, politically incorrect or,
certainly, poor ‘grantsmanship.’
The third and final notion is one that I find difficult to accept, but I
find abundant evidence for it and I frequently experience it. Walter
Kaufmann states in the prologue to his English translation of Martin Buber’s
book, I and Thou—‘Mundus Vult Decepi: The world wants to be deceived. The
truth is too complex and frightening; the taste for truth is an acquired
taste that few acquire’ (Page 9, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1970).
“Finally, my conclusion to this ongoing career, is best summarized by Omar
Khayyam XXVII
Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument
About it and about: but evermore
Came out by the same door wherein I went.
With them the seed of wisdom did I sow,
And with my own hand wrought to make it grow;
And this was all the Harvest that I reap’d—
“I came like Water, and like Wind I go.”
“With regard to your interest in knowing what I’m currently doing, the
answer is simple. I am pursuing three major goals: 1) continuing studies on
the role(s) of cellular water in health and disease; 2) evaluating the
therapeutic value of magnetic fields in the human; and, 3) establishing our
company (Petroclean, L.L.C.) which is dedicated to the elimination of
petrochemical contamination in our soil and water and to increasing the
productivity of our land.’
Letters to Vernon Bishop
John Spitzer writes: “Thank
you for the good wishes for my 80th birthday. Taking stock on this occasion,
I have to conclude that I have been blessed in both my professional
endeavors and my private life, especially if I recall arriving as an
immigrant 56 years ago with 25 cents in my pocket. My 52-year membership in
APS and other scientific society memberships provided me with satisfying
intellectual homes. Being surrounded by students, fellows and colleagues
with a variety of backgrounds and experiences had been very stimulating.
Serving as a faculty member at Hahnemann Medical College for 17 years and as
the Department Head of a great faculty for 27 years at the LSU Health
Sciences Center in New Orleans had been a wonderful experience. Directing
two Institutional Training Grants, a Program Project and a Center Grant (in
addition to RO1s) had been a great challenge and a lot of fun. My private
life has been made wonderfully happy by Judy, my wife of 56 years, our two
children and their families. I say this in spite of some quite rude bumps
along the road. Hurricane Katrina was responsible for the most recent one,
by inundating our one-story home with six to eight feet of dirty, infested,
90+ degree water for about two weeks, thus, destroying the contents and our
belongings. This event made me a very experienced evacuee/refugee/DP
(displaced person), as it happened for the third time in my life that I
became such a person. (The first time I lost everything was during the Shoah,
courtesy of Nazi Germany, the second time, a few years later when leaving
Communist Hungary.) After Katrina we relocated back to the Philadelphia
area, where we had lived prior to moving to New Orleans in 1973. Thankfully,
the presence of our children and their families considerably ameliorated the
trauma of rebuilding our lives under these down-sized conditions. So now we
are enjoying the love of our family, the company of some friends, the
cultural opportunities that Philadelphia offers and some traveling, while
keeping an anxious eye from a distance on our former Department’s struggles
to recover from a very bad nightmare.”
Werner P. Koella writes: “Thank you ever so much for your kind letter
of April 3 and the informing formulary of the American Physiological
Society. Both reached me five days before I turned 90 years old. I greatly
enjoyed receiving news from my most ‘important’ professional society. But I
am afraid that I cannot give much interesting news concerning my ‘doings.’
Since my eyesight is not too good anymore, I cannot read anything that would
inform me about the program in Physiology. But I enjoy the news I hear from
my colleagues. But I hear well enough to listen (for two to three hours) to
music and I still play the accordion. In addition, I watch television (news,
scientific presentations and, occasionally, a movie). And, occasionally, I
talk (physiological) business with one of the few colleagues I still have
contact with. I started to reduce my ‘physiological science activities’ at
about the age of 76, when I was ‘reduced’ in my bodily and mental
capabilities by a coronary mishap. But the bodily capacities came back to
some extent, and I still could maintain to a certain extent my mode of daily
walking. I still walk about a mile (or a little more) every day. Then I
occasionally ‘play’ with one of my three grandsons or with my granddaughter.
As to walking in my first 25 years of retirement, I walked a little bit more
than 15,000 miles. That kept me in good shape.
“So, I can say that I had altogether, a good, if not a very happy,
retirement. I still quite often think of all the good things I could enjoy
during my professional life, in particular the 17 years I worked in the USA
(1951-1968).
“PS: In 1972 I founded the European Sleep Research Society and acted as its
first president till 1989. In 1988, I published a monograph: ‘The Physiology
of Sleep.’” |
