Chemistry,microscopy and smell: bloodstains and nineteenth-century legal medicine

This paper analyses the development of three methods for detecting bloodstains during the first half of the nineteenth-century in France. After dealing with the main problems in detecting bloodstains, the paper describes the chemical tests introduced in the mid-1820s. Then the first uses of the microscope in the detection of bloodstains around 1827 are discussed. The most controversial method is then examined, the smell test introduced by Jean-Pierre Barruel in 1829, and the debates which took place in French academies and learned societies during ensuing years are surveyed. Moving to the courtrooms a review is conducted of how the different methods were employed in criminal trials. By reviewing these cases, the main arguments against Barruel's test during the 1830s are explored as well as the changes making possible the return of the microscope to legal medicine around 1840. By reconstructing the history of these three methods, the paper reveals how the senses of smell and vision (colours and microscopic images) were employed in order to produce convincing evidence in both academies and courts. The paper questions two linear master narratives that are organized in terms of progress and decline: the development of forensic science as a result of continued technological progress; and the supposed decline of smell in the history of the senses, particularly in the realm of chemistry and medicine.     

Testing testimony: toxicology and the law of evidence in early nineteenth-century England

Examines how, when confronted with a case of possible criminal poisoning, early-19th-century English toxicologists sought to generate and to represent their evidence in the courtroom. Contends that in both these activities, toxicologists were inextricably engaged in a complex communicative exercise. On the one hand, they distanced themselves from the instabilities of language, styling themselves as testifiers to fact alone. At the same time, they saw themselves as deeply implicated in the difficulties of forging a coherent signifying system out of a disparate collection of signs that in themselves bore no intrinsic meaning. The article suggests first, why criminal poisoning featured so prominently in the burgeoning legal literature on evidence, which provided the framework for expert testimony in English courts; next, that the scientific evidence offered by toxicologists in poisoning cases can be usefully understood as a form of (unstable) language; and finally, that this recourse to signs informed the toxicologist's encounter with another type of courtroom expert - the legal advocate - who was equally (though differently) interested in manipulating signs in order to construct (and deconstruct) legally sanctioned proof.     

Before words: reading western astronomical texts in early nineteenth-century Japan

SUMMARY

In 1803, the most prominent Japanese astronomer of his time, Takahashi Yoshitoki, received a newly imported Dutch translation of J. J. Lalande's ‘Astronomie’. He could not read Dutch, yet he dedicated almost a year to a close examination of this massive work, taking notes and contemplating his own astronomical practices. How did he read a book he could not read? Following the clues Yoshitoki left in his notes, we discover that he found meanings not only in words, but also in what are often taken for granted or considered to be auxiliary tools for data manipulation, such as symbols, units, tables, and diagrams. His rendering of these non-verbal textual elements into a familiar format was crucial for Yoshitoki's reading, and constituted the initial step in the process of integrating Lalande's astronomy into Japanese astronomical practices, and the subsequent translation of the text into Japanese.     

Blood clots: the nineteenth-century debate over the substance and means of transfusion in Britain

Historians have devoted little attention to blood transfusion in the nineteenth century. In part, this neglect reflects the presentist assumption that, before Karl Landsteiner's discovery of blood types, this practice would have failed too often to gain currency. Yet, transfusion was in fact the subject of much debate, and was actively practised, primarily by obstetricians on haemorrhaging women. Examining this practice through the conceptual lens of 'blood clots', both as noun and as observation, I follow transfusors' assumptions about the nature of the blood and the problem of its coagulation. Tracing the medicalization of ideas about blood by the century's end, I map this shift onto changing notions about why transfusion was performed, what substance was best employed, and what instrument best fitted that substance's movement into the circulation. In this way, 'Blood Clots' reconstructs the discourse surrounding transfusion, extending that discourse to material culture in order to illuminate the rationale that guided transfusion's practice in nineteenth-century Britain.     

In pursuit of precision: the calibration of minds and machines in late nineteenth-century psychology

A prominent feature of late nineteenth-century psychology was its intense preoccupation with precision. Precision was at once an ideal and an argument: the quest for precision helped psychology to establish its status as a mature science, sharing a characteristic concern with the natural sciences. We will analyse how psychologists set out to produce precision in 'mental chronometry', the measurement of the duration of psychological processes. In his Leipzig laboratory, Wundt inaugurated an elaborate research programme on mental chronometry. We will look at the problem of calibration of experimental apparatus and will describe the intricate material, literary, and social technologies involved in the manufacture of precision. First, we shall discuss some of the technical problems involved in the measurement of ever shorter time-spans. Next, the Cattell-Berger experiments will help us to argue against the received view that all the precision went into the hardware, and practically none into the social organization of experimentation. Experimenters made deliberate efforts to bring themselves and their subjects under a regime of control and calibration similar to that which reigned over the experimental machinery. In Leipzig psychology, the particular blend of material and social technology resulted in a specific object of study: the generalized mind. We will then show that the distribution of precision in experimental psychology outside Leipzig demanded a concerted effort of instruments, texts, and people. It will appear that the forceful attempts to produce precision and uniformity had some rather paradoxical consequences.     

Skeletal muscle titin: physiology and pathophysiology

Titins are a family of gigantic filamentous muscle proteins essential for muscle structure, function and development. Most of their sequence consists of repetitive modules of two superfamily motifs, immunoglobulin and fibronectin, interspersed with unique sequences. A special feature is that many regions are differentially expressed in different muscle types, providing unique characteristics. Titin is evolutionarily old, and many regions are highly conserved. Most mutations that alter titin's characteristics seem to be incompatible with life, since very few associated genetic diseases have been described. The autoimmune response against titin in the paraneoplastic form of myasthenia gravis is discussed.     

Flying insects: model systems in exercise physiology

Insect flight is the most energy-demanding exercise known. It requires very effective coupling of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) hydrolysis and regeneration in the working flight muscles.³¹P nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy of locust flight muscle in vivo has shown that flight causes only a small decrease in the content of ATP, whereas the free concentrations of inorganic phosphate (P _i ), adenosine diphosphate (ADP) and adenosine monophosphate (AMP) were estimated to increase by about 3-, 5- and 27-fold, respectively. These metabolites are potent activators of glycogen phosphorylase and phosphofructokinase (PFK). Activation of glycolysis by AMP and P _i is reinforced synergistically by fructose 2,6-bisphosphate (F2,6P₂), a very potent activator of PFK. During prolonged flight locusts gradually change from using carbohydrate to lipids as their main fuel. This requires a decrease in glycolytic flux which is brought about, at least in part, by a marked decrease in the content of F2,6P₂ in flight muscle (by 80% within 15 min of flight). The synthesis of F2,6P₂ in flight muscle can be stimulated by the nervous system via the biogenic amine octopamine. Octopamine and F2,6P₂ seem to be part of a mechanism to control the rate of carbohydrate oxidation in flight muscle and thus function in the metabolic integration of insect flight.Dedicated to Dr. Ernst Zebe, Emeritus Professor of Zoology (University of Münster) on the occasion of his 70th birthday.     

Heparanase involvement in physiology and disease

Heparanase is an endoglycosidase that degrades heparan sulfate on the cell surface and extracellular matrix. The physiological functions of heparanase include heparan sulfate turnover, embryo development, hair growth, and wound healing. Heparanase is implicated in a variety of pathologies, such as tumor growth, angiogenesis, metastasis, inflammation, and glomerular diseases. Heparanase overexpression in a variety of malignant tumors suggests that it could be a target for anti-cancer therapy.     

Publishing and the classics: Paley’s Natural theology and the nineteenth-century scientific canon

This article seeks a new way to conceptualise the ‘classic’ work in the history of science, and suggests that the use of publishing history might help avoid the antagonism which surrounded the literary canon wars. It concentrates on the widely acknowledged concept that the key to the classic work is the fact of its being read over a prolonged period of time. Continued reading implies that a work is able to remain relevant to later generations of readers, and, although some of this depends upon the openness of the original text, much more depends on the actions of subsequent publishers and editors in repackaging the work for later audiences.This is illustrated through an examination of the long publishing history of William Paley’s Natural theology (1802). Over the course of the century, Natural theology was read as a work of gentlemanly natural theology, as a work which could be used in a formal or informal education in science, and as a work of Christian apologetic. These transformations occurred because of the actions of the later publishers and editors who had to make the work suit the current interests of the literary marketplace. Comparisons are made to Constitution of man, Vestiges of the natural history of creation and Origin of species.     

Captivity affects behavioral physiology: plasticity in signaling sexual identity

Little is known about the link between captivity, physiology, and behavior in wild-caught vertebrates. Anecdotal evidence suggests that hormonal changes are responsible for behavioral changes in wild animals brought into captivity. Studying the effects of captivity on reproduction is hampered because wild animals often fail to exhibit sexual behavior under captive conditions. In weakly discharging electric fish, field studies have reported sex differences in electric organ discharges which are rarely seen in the laboratory. I now report the results of a series of laboratory investigations which show that Gnathonemus petersii exhibits seasonal, hormone-dependent, phase-specific sex differences in electric organ discharges. Captivity dramatically alters and may even reverse these sex differences as a result of rapid changes in endogenous plasma hormone levels. These findings have broad implications for research on animal physiology and behavior performed in laboratory settings.     

Captivity affects behavioral physiology: Plasticity in signaling sexual identity

Summary Little is known about the link between captivity, physiology, and behavior in wild-caught vertebrates. Anecdotal evidence suggests that hormonal changes are responsible for behavioral changes in wild animals brought into captivity. Studying the effects of captivity on reproduction is hampered because wild animals often fail to exhibit sexual behavior under captive conditions. In weakly discharging electric fish, field studies have reported sex differences in electric organ discharges which are rarely seen in the laboratory. I now report the results of a series of laboratory investigations which show thatGnathonemus petersii exhibits seasonal, hormone-dependent, phasespecific sex differences in electric organ discharges. Captivity dramatically alters and may even reverse these sex differences as a result of rapid changes in endogenous plasma hormone levels. These findings have broad implications for research on animal physiology and behavior performed in laboratory settings.     

Grape vine physiology: the contribution of culture in vitro

Conclusion In the area of cell and tissue physiology, the grape vine has been a major reference material. As with all woody perennials, in vitro technologies are relatively delicate. Nevertheless, remarkable progress has produced a situation where, during the past ten years, practical application of results from in vitro work has been envisaged. Reciprocal understanding has yet to be established between scientists developing micropropagation (multiplication with conformity to type) and those using in vitro methods for variety improvement (multiplication for novelty of type). I am convinced that the future should not see one of these objectives dominating the other. On the contrary, certain technologies should be developed to ensure a framework for conformity of propagation and others to obtain greater variability with the goal of plant improvement. This will render effective the two applications considered.