Dr. Noguchi's Journey: A Life of Medical Search and Discovery
http://www.100md.com
《新英格兰医药杂志》
Although more than 100 biographies of Hideyo Noguchi (1876–1928) have been published in Japanese, this book is the first one to be translated into English. As a Japanese microbiologist and immunologist, I think that Peter Durfee has produced an excellent translation of this chronicle of Noguchi's life, which was originally written in Japanese by Atsushi Kita and published in Japan in 2003.
(Figure)
Hideyo Noguchi.
Courtesy of Kodansha International.
Noguchi is widely known in Japan as one of the country's greatest medical scientists. In fact, he was recently honored once again when the government put his portrait on the new version of the most widely distributed 1,000-yen bill. Noguchi's outstanding research and the remarkable results that he achieved are not as well known outside Japan as they should be, and this book should help to remedy that situation. Kita conveys the enthusiasm and passion that Noguchi felt for his work and gives a compelling description of his eventful life. I am sure that readers of this book will come to feel a strong admiration and respect for Noguchi's extraordinary character and career.
Bacteriology made remarkable advances, mainly in Europe, at the end of the 19th century through the efforts of pioneers like Louis Pasteur (1822–1895) and Robert Koch (1843–1910), who became known as "microbe hunters." The brilliant results Noguchi achieved while working in the United States made him a member of the ranks of these hunters. He is probably best remembered for the discovery of Treponema pallidum, the pathogen of syphilis, in the brain of a patient with cerebral syphilis. Simon Flexner, the first director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research (now known as Rockefeller University), who was Noguchi's mentor from the time he was at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine through his sojourn at the Rockefeller Institute, said that Noguchi was like a man possessed, thinking nothing of working straight through the night for days on end. Indeed, he was known to investigators around him as the "human dynamo."
For the last 10 years of his life, Noguchi was devoted to the study of yellow fever, paying visits to Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Jamaica, and other countries in energetic pursuit of his research. At the age of 50, he left the United States for Africa to continue his work on yellow fever. He died one year later, on May 21, 1928, at the age of 51, in Accra, now the capital of Ghana in West Africa. The cause of death was yellow fever and his last words were, "I do not understand." Perhaps, like the beaten Santiago in Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, Noguchi was dreaming about the lions when he was fading away.
The next day, in an obituary in the New York Times entitled "Dr. Noguchi Is Dead, Martyr of Science," he was described as a "world-famous bacteriologist, who died yesterday, a victim of research." On June 15, 1928, a memorial service for Noguchi was held at the Rockefeller Institute with both the Japanese and American flags flying at half-mast. Noguchi was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx with "Through Devotion to Science / He Lived and Died for Humanity" inscribed on his headstone.
Noguchi was born in a destitute village to a poor farming family. At about 1 year of age he suffered a severe burn on his left hand, and the impressions he later formed at the age of 15, when he was operated on for that burn by a surgeon who was educated in the United States, led him to study medicine. His parents hoped he would become a farmer, but his injury put an end to that career. With his indomitable spirit and extraordinary effort, he was able to overcome the barriers of language, education, and customs. Readers of this book cannot fail to be deeply impressed by Noguchi's remarkable rise to the highest levels of international medicine. Noguchi's main research activities started after he went to the United States in 1900. By the time he died, he had published close to 200 papers in many prestigious journals. As quoted throughout this book, Noguchi left behind many statements that still inspire us today, and I will end this review with one of these statements: "Patience is a bitter thing to bear, but its fruits are sweet."
Hiromichi Ishikawa, M.D., Ph.D.
Keio University School of Medicine
Tokyo 160-8582, Japan
h-ishika@sc.itc.keio.ac.jp(By Atsushi Kita. Translat)
(Figure)
Hideyo Noguchi.
Courtesy of Kodansha International.
Noguchi is widely known in Japan as one of the country's greatest medical scientists. In fact, he was recently honored once again when the government put his portrait on the new version of the most widely distributed 1,000-yen bill. Noguchi's outstanding research and the remarkable results that he achieved are not as well known outside Japan as they should be, and this book should help to remedy that situation. Kita conveys the enthusiasm and passion that Noguchi felt for his work and gives a compelling description of his eventful life. I am sure that readers of this book will come to feel a strong admiration and respect for Noguchi's extraordinary character and career.
Bacteriology made remarkable advances, mainly in Europe, at the end of the 19th century through the efforts of pioneers like Louis Pasteur (1822–1895) and Robert Koch (1843–1910), who became known as "microbe hunters." The brilliant results Noguchi achieved while working in the United States made him a member of the ranks of these hunters. He is probably best remembered for the discovery of Treponema pallidum, the pathogen of syphilis, in the brain of a patient with cerebral syphilis. Simon Flexner, the first director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research (now known as Rockefeller University), who was Noguchi's mentor from the time he was at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine through his sojourn at the Rockefeller Institute, said that Noguchi was like a man possessed, thinking nothing of working straight through the night for days on end. Indeed, he was known to investigators around him as the "human dynamo."
For the last 10 years of his life, Noguchi was devoted to the study of yellow fever, paying visits to Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Jamaica, and other countries in energetic pursuit of his research. At the age of 50, he left the United States for Africa to continue his work on yellow fever. He died one year later, on May 21, 1928, at the age of 51, in Accra, now the capital of Ghana in West Africa. The cause of death was yellow fever and his last words were, "I do not understand." Perhaps, like the beaten Santiago in Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, Noguchi was dreaming about the lions when he was fading away.
The next day, in an obituary in the New York Times entitled "Dr. Noguchi Is Dead, Martyr of Science," he was described as a "world-famous bacteriologist, who died yesterday, a victim of research." On June 15, 1928, a memorial service for Noguchi was held at the Rockefeller Institute with both the Japanese and American flags flying at half-mast. Noguchi was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx with "Through Devotion to Science / He Lived and Died for Humanity" inscribed on his headstone.
Noguchi was born in a destitute village to a poor farming family. At about 1 year of age he suffered a severe burn on his left hand, and the impressions he later formed at the age of 15, when he was operated on for that burn by a surgeon who was educated in the United States, led him to study medicine. His parents hoped he would become a farmer, but his injury put an end to that career. With his indomitable spirit and extraordinary effort, he was able to overcome the barriers of language, education, and customs. Readers of this book cannot fail to be deeply impressed by Noguchi's remarkable rise to the highest levels of international medicine. Noguchi's main research activities started after he went to the United States in 1900. By the time he died, he had published close to 200 papers in many prestigious journals. As quoted throughout this book, Noguchi left behind many statements that still inspire us today, and I will end this review with one of these statements: "Patience is a bitter thing to bear, but its fruits are sweet."
Hiromichi Ishikawa, M.D., Ph.D.
Keio University School of Medicine
Tokyo 160-8582, Japan
h-ishika@sc.itc.keio.ac.jp(By Atsushi Kita. Translat)