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Senior Physiologists' News |
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Letters to Charles Tipton Vivian Abrahams writes: “I can only claim to be happily retired. I stayed past the mandatory retirement age of 65 as I was a Medical Research Council of Canada Research Group Director at Queen’s University, as well as being part of the management of the one of the Networks in the Canadian Networks of Excellence and a Human Frontiers Research Program Councillor. This work was superimposed on the full range of teaching and administrative responsibilities of a University Professor. Retirement was quite welcome. However, my interest was not totally dimmed and for six or seven years after retirement I attended scientific meetings and continue to scan the journals, and even read the occasional article. “No real words of wisdom. Had the good fortune to go to a superb school that had its origins before the discovery of America (City of London School, 1442) and which offered exemplary science teaching. Was sent initially to the University of Edinburgh by the British Army to improve my math and physics and returned there after the Army funded by a grateful nation. Discovered Physiology largely because of a group of superb teachers with a deep commitment to research and to their students.” Hugh Welch writes: “It was good to hear from you, although I was taken back a bit to realize that I had joined that society of ‘Senior Physiologists,’ whose letters I have read with great interest for the past 30-40 years. “In reading those letters in The Physiologist, I have been struck by the different ways these individuals approached their 70th birthdays. Some seemed to move almost seamlessly through that period and continued in the same way in their laboratories or in their writing. Others seemed to make a complete break and to start an entirely different style of life. “My path has been somewhere in between these two extremes. My work required a skilled team in the lab, and when my university made a decision to put its emphasis in the Life Sciences program into molecular biology, I realized that the resources I needed would become less available. I made the decision to phase out the lab and see my last graduate students through the completion of their programs. “As members of the Physiology faculty retired, they were typically replaced by geneticists or molecular biologists, and eventually Physiology was merged into a large department of Biochemistry and Cellular and Molecular Biology. There is almost no Physiology presence in that department that most of us would recognize. “My impression is that this experience is not unusual; the Physiology department where I trained is now a Department of Physiological Genomics. I was not sure of the wisdom of these decisions, but they were clearly here to stay, and I opted to retire somewhat early. “Shortly after that, I began to receive invitations to teach Physiology at institutions where I had friends or former students. These were typically the result of open positions and the need to fill courses, especially graduate courses in Physiology. I had always enjoyed teaching, and this proved to be an enjoyable and rewarding experience. Fortunately, I have a wife who was amenable to the short term moves that were required, and we had the opportunity to renew some old friendships and make some new ones. “I found the need for Physiology courses to be enormous and the general quality of instruction to be disappointing. There seems to be an attitude that anyone can teach Physiology, and it was discouraging to see the low regard that students had toward a subject that I regard as one of the most important, not only in the Life Sciences, but as a part of a Liberal Arts education. “These new, large, catchall departments seem to generally assign their weakest faculty to handle the Physiology courses. I sometimes think that APS has let slip an opportunity that exists in institutions that do not have medical schools on the campus. There are many potential positions in Physiology that are being filled by faculty from other disciplines. “Beyond that, I have found retirement rewarding, especially having the time to spend with grandchildren. They are spread as far as 500 miles in different directions, so this entails quite a bit of travel. “Thanks again for your card and the kind note.” Kenneth Zierler writes: “Thanks for the invitation to offer a brief summary of my life, with emphasis on the 10 years since I became emeritus, at the age of 80. Now I am 90. For the first 7 1/2 years of my life I was an only child. My father drove me on his rounds. My mother’s preoccupation was with my education. She was responsible for urging school administrators to advance me, so that I was only 18 when I got my A.B. degree at Hopkins. “I was stimulated by the head of my high school math department, Dr. Ballard. At college I majored in chemistry, but I was equally fond of English and Math. At the University of Maryland Medical School, while I was a student I worked in the lab of Dr. William R. Amberson, who had worked with A.V. Hill, a physicist who became one of the leaders in muscle physiology. I was resident in internal medicine on the NYU service of Dr. Murray Steele, who generously let me use his lab after 5 p.m. and taught me that one could be a wise clinician and at the same time carry out lab research. While I was Dr. Steele’s resident I was allowed to make observations of patients in a ward full of patients with muscular dystrophy at the Rockefeller University, across the street from our Hospital. The main outcome of my investigation was that I recognized that some number of patients with skeletal muscular dystrophy had cardiac muscular dystrophy, which had not been described. “Two months before I would have completed my chief residency, I quit to join the Army. I was on active duty for three years. For the first half I was assigned to the Army Air Corps, where I was mostly a ward officer in an air corps station hospital. The second half of my service was as battalion surgeon in an armored division. In mid-April, 1945, my battalion came upon a concentration, or slave-labor, camp in the south east corner of the Harz Mountains, where I was briefly supplying elementary medical care. “On my return to Baltimore, discharged honorably from the Army, Dr.Warfield Longcope, chairman of the department of medicine at Hopkins, accepted me, and gave me a small room but no money. I found a Warburg apparatus in a cupboard and began my studies. At the same time I was studying, creatinuria, because creatinuria was considered a hallmark of muscle disease. But I had found that post-partum creatinuria was not due to discharge from the healing uterus but rather to failure of the renal tubules to absorb creatine. At the same time I was disappointed in the Warburg apparatus. It could measure 02 only in dying muscle. At the time, I was calculating creatine clearance in normal volunteers and in certain diseases. The determination of creatine clearance is essentially an input-output-stay-put method. I decided that I would measure the arterio- venous difference of whatever we are interested in, forearm muscle uptake (blood oxygen and glucose), and blood CO2 forearm muscle output and forearm venous blood lactic acid, all in people. We successfully developed a technique for measuring forearm arterial and venous differences, and to our surprise found that oxidation of glucose accounted for only about 16% of oxidation by forearm muscle. We found that about 84% of serum free fatty acids were the substrate for the observed forearm oxidation. “Paul Meier and I published a mathematical analysis of the theory of indicator-dilution method for measurement of blood flow and volume. Its use has been applied to many parts of the circulation. “At the same time I was developing a technique for measuring the electrical potential across the cell membrane in isolated muscle, and, later, in single muscle fibers. It had been known for many years that insulin reduces serum potassium concentration, and we expected to find that the transmembrane potential difference increased hyperpolarization. But the decrease in serum K, lagged behind the progressive hyperpolarization; that is, the hyperpolarization was responsible for the uptake of K, not that the low K was responsible for the hyperpolarization. Insulin-induced hyperpolarization is probably an early step in the cascade that produces glucose uptake. “I have several ‘think’ papers: on the theory of indicator-dilution, theory of the use of arterio-venous concentration differences for measuring metabolism in steady and non-steady states, why tracer-dilution curves through a vascular system have the shape they do, an error in interpreting Scatchard plots, a critique of compartmental analysis. An especially interesting one is that I demonstrated mathematically that the prevailing belief, that insulin-induced increase in the amount of plasma membrane GLUTS can account for the entire increased glucose uptake. At least half the increased glucose uptake is accounted for by increased rate of membrane GLUT; this is a mathematical necessity whenever there is more than one type of GLUT in the plasma membrane. I felt that my paper was helpful, on the theory of the use of arterio-venous concentration differences for metabolism in steady and non-steady states, which appeared in J. Clin. Invest. in 1964. “Our lab group, using the forearm arterio-venous and Blue Dye muscle blood flow method, demonstrated that in Type 2 diabetes mellitus there is resistance to post-receptor action of insulin. A similar resistance to insulin was demonstrated in some obese subjects who did not have diabetes. “I became emeritus professor of medicine and of physiology when I became 80 in 1997. I was fortunate in that I retain an office, five days a week, with a computer, a spot in a parking garage, a telephone. Since 1997 I have reviewed my some 200 lab notebooks and found some worthwhile unpublished work. The data were obtained in 1955 and written and published in Diabetologia in 2002, an interval that even Darwin did not reach. Since I became emeritus I have been invited to write two papers; one invitation was “Whole body glucose metabolism,” Am J Physiology: the other, “Indicator dilution methods...A brief history and memoir.” I have always loved teaching, and have been blessed with the intelligence and enthusiasm of our scholars. “I have been lucky in my colleagues, the post-docs and the students.” Letter to Beverly Bishop F. Eugene Yates writes: “Having enjoyed autobiographical reports from the many very durable scientists you have been publishing in The Physiologist, I am delighted to get my turn, after I celebrated my 80th birthday last week. Your invitation and questions naturally evoked memories and reflections on the shape of my whole career, so I begin with a sketch of its six epochs, before presuming to offer fragments of (as you put it) ‘wisdom to pass on to (my) younger colleagues.’ I composed this reply, in outline, as I was skiing on a blue sky day, in good snow, at Park City Mountain Resort in Utah. As a result, my endorphins are high as I write. “While I was overseas serving as a Navy doctor during the Korean War, I had much time to think about the next step of my career when I got out of the service. I knew I wanted more scientific education, so I applied (by brief telegrams!) to Gene Landis, head of the Harvard Physiology Department, and to Arnold Rich in Pathology at Hopkins, seeking a postdoctoral fellowship. After a few weeks I received a telegram from Harvard accepting me, with details to follow in a letter. I accepted via return telegram immediately. (The very next day I received an acceptance from Hopkins, and had these responses reached me in reverse order I would have had a very different professional life!). “I have been a member of The American Physiological Society for over 50 years, and my best contribution to APS was to invent, and launch the section journal AJP: Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative. I was its first Editor in Chief, and introduced three special sections: Letters, Invited Opinions, and Modeling Methodology Forum (that included a home for formal statistics). I also founded the Annals of Biomedical Engineering for the BME Society, edited it for seven years, and became the third President of the Society. I also founded Endocrine Reviews for the Endocrine Society. All three journals are currently thriving. “The ‘epochs’ of my career, in sequence, unfolded as seven years in the Physiology Department at Harvard, ten years in the Physiology Department at Stanford (where I ultimately became Executive), ten years in the Biomedical Engineering Department at the University of Southern California (where I served as Director of an NIH-sponsored Medical Engineering Center), and 23 years at UCLA, (where for the initial seven of those years I was the first Director of the Crump Institute for Medical Engineering, the Ralph and Marjorie Crump Professor of Medical Engineering and also Professor of Chemical Engineering ), and for all 23 years also Professor of Medicine. From 1970 to 1997 I was a Consulting Principal Scientist to the ALZA Corporation, working on designs and clinical trials for novel, controlled delivery systems for therapeutic drugs, and for the past seven years I have been a member of the External Advisory Council of the NASA-affiliated National Space Biomedical Research Institute in Houston. “I retired from academic life in 2003. I am currently active as a Science Advisor to the John Douglas French Alzheimer’s Foundation, with an office in their headquarters (email: gyates@jdfaf.org), and am continuing as a member of the External Advisory Council of the National Space Biomedical Research Institute/NASA, that is preparing medical support for the many and varied risk factors associated with astronauts in long-duration space flights, away from a near-earth orbit. “Traveling along my unguided career path—a seemingly random walk—I encountered and benefited from the experience and wisdom of many scientists, including: Cliff Barger (skills in gentle handling of chronic preparations in animals who remained unstressed), John Pappenheimer (introduction to transport phenomena), Bob Brennan (computer simulation of engineering control systems), Tom Sebeok (signs, symbols and significance), Arthur Iberall (a new physics for complex systems), Phil Anderson (needed balance between reductionism (analysis) and holism (synthesis) for many comprehensive descriptions in sciences, and showing that they are not technical inverses), Howard Pattee (information versus dynamics in biology), Bob Rosen (a mathematics for complexity), Alex Zaffaroni (adding control to chemistry in pharmaceutical science), Walter Bortz (showing me that good medical science can be an effective basis for sensible public health policies, and Larry Young (countermeasures against risk factors for long-duration, human space flights). I owe them all (and many others –including students and post-docs) profound thanks for the joy and passion their insights have added to my professional life. “My current research focuses on three themes: 1) theories of senescence (why do we grow old and die?); 2) reinterpretation of subjective neo-Darwinian natural selection as objective dynamic filtering-in evolution, senescence and extinctions; 3) extension of Cannon’s concept of homeostasis (the core theory of physiologists) as a new, physical stability and control theory for biology, that I call homeodynamics. I am actively publishing and presenting my work in each area. “As for advice for young scientists, I yield to the classic books by Ramón y Cajal, Peter Medawar and Walter Cannon. I can add only that I notice certain common temperaments among my favorite colleagues in science: all have deep respect for rules of evidence, humility in the face of what they don’t (yet) understand, courtesy toward colleagues and openness in discussions of their own past and present work. (That latter feature can be very difficult to sustain in a commercial world where non-scientific requirements for secrecy intrude.) I also notice that some colleagues are ‘splitters’ (reductionistic analysis is their style) while others are ‘lumpers’ who want the big picture with all its complexities and mysteries. They like synthesis. A few try to adopt both styles – at the risk of being, or being thought to be, dilettantes. My modest advice to young scientists is merely: Do what you want to do, and do it now, with whatever scientific style fits most happily. “Finally, though it may not be generalizable, I have found that a durable marriage (57 years and counting) with a person you like, admire and have much in common with (in my senior year of medical school I married one of my classmates—who happened to be the daughter of one of our faculty ‘greats’ in internal medicine) greatly enhances the professional journey by providing a secure and emotionally fulfilling base. Our five children and eight grandchildren add a guarantee that I shall die a happy man. Letter to Hannah Carey Kiyo Koizumi writes: “It was a surprise and a great pleasure to receive your gracious letter and a beautiful gift for being a member of the APS for 50 years. I did not expect to be honored in such a ‘big’ way. “I have found that working as a physiologist in this country is truly a rewarding and blessing experience for me. I came to the USA in 1949 as a young MD from Japan, went to Wayne University Medical College in Detroit (then a city university), and in 1951 found a job at the present SUNY Downstate Medical Center under Prof. Chandler McC. Brooks, Chairman of Dept. of Physiology. He too was honored as a 50-year member of the APS in his lifetime. “With a great help of Dr. Brooks and many of my postdoctoral fellows mostly from abroad, I could make some accomplishments in the field of physiology as well as gain satisfaction as a teacher to many medical students. “When I was elected to become a member of the APS in 1957, we needed to have at least one paper with a sole authorship. I am grateful to Dr. Brooks, my life-long mentor, who encouraged me to accomplish the step in my early career in his Department. Since those early days the physiology and medical sciences have advanced greatly, but I am still thrilled to find the beauty and mystery of how our body functions. “Although I now come to ‘work’ twice a week to advise to and also being pampered by my young associates at our laboratory, I am not very active in research or in teaching. My interest in the field still persists, however, and I enjoy reading the Physiological Review and other scientific journals. “Regrettably, I neglected to respond to a letter from the APS concerning the society’s ‘Senior Physiologist’ section at my 80th birthday three years ago. I felt then it was too early in my life to do so, although I was honored on that occasion in Japan at the Japanese Physiological Society Meeting. “I do hope that our Society will continue to contribute to the scientific development and the better understanding of disease processes. |
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