An historical review is made of Antarctic medical practice, which is unique because of the absence of an indigenous population. This review begins with the primitive shipboard practice of doctors accompanying Captain James Cook around 1775 and concludes with the modern era of permanent stations and vast scientific endeavour. The heroic era of Scott, Shackleton, Amundsen and Mawson and the highly mechanized transition period are contrasted with the present day. Medical practice on modern expeditions has reached a high standard, but there is still much to be learned concerning human adaptation. Comment is made on the possible utilization of Antarctica's natural resources bringing increases in polar populations and facilitating the expansion of medical research in the future era of polar medicine.
A brief history of the discovery of tick-borne encephalitis virus in the late 1930s (based on reminiscences of members of the expeditions, their colleagues, and relatives).
Tick-borne encephalitis virus is the etiological agent of a severe human disease transmitted by hard ticks. It occurs in large parts of eastern, central, and western Asia and in Europe with thousands of human cases each year. Here, the discovery of the virus by Soviet scientists in the late 1930s in the Far East is described. The pioneering work involved with this discovery, which resulted in great scientific and epidemiological achievement, was undertaken under the most difficult conditions, and some of the scientists and their technical assistants paid for it with their health and even their lives. This paper briefly outlines the steps on the way that elucidated the basic etiology and eco-epidemiology of the disease, and does not omit that, as one result of the expeditions and the political situation in the former Soviet Union at that time, some scientists were sent to prison.
The spreading of Tibetan Buddhism and with it the Tibetan medicine in the region east of Lake Baikal, goes back to the 17th century. At the beginning of the 18th century, German speaking scholars were among the first to undertake scientific expeditions through Siberia. As such they were amongst the first scientists of the modern era who encountered the traditions, concepts, and therapeutic methods of Tibetan medicine. The aim of this article is to describe and analyze these first encounters with Tibetan medicine by the example of selected men of science of the 18th and 19th century. This work is based on extensive studies of sources in archives and libraries in Russia and Switzerland. We found documents related to the following scientists: Daniel Gottlieb Messerschmidt (1685-1735), Johann Georg Gmelin (1709-1755), Erik Laxmann (1737-1796), Friedrich Adelung (1768-1843), and Joseph Rehmann (1779-1831). They mentioned the distribution of Tibetan medicine within Russia, the use of medicinal plants and formulas as well as therapeutic techniques. For the scientific community of the time these first encounters of Europeans with practitioners of Tibetan medicine could not lift Tibetan medicine out of other exotic context in the field of ethnography. For today's researchers, these encounters are an important evidence for more than 300 years of development of Tibetan medicine on the vast territory of Siberia. The practice and the scientific examination of Tibetan medicine in Siberia is an active endeavor until today. The present work shows that it is possible and rewarding to follow up the historic and cultural connections from Europe to Asia via the Siberian link.
The sea monster played an important part in launching the Danish Galathea Deep Sea Expedition of 1950-1952. Part scientific object, part media darling and part fundraising strategy, the sea monster brought scientists, journalists and politicians together in support of the expedition. The scientific leader of the expedition, Anton F. Bruun, contended the scientific reality of such a creature; the leader of the press section attached to the expedition, Hakon Mielche, dreamt of the grand headlines finding the sea monster would attract; and everyone involved used the 'poor little thing' to promote the expedition to sponsors and in public.
