My Science School

Shoemaker’s achievements went far beyond this discovery. Between 1980 and 1994, as a member of the Palomar Asteroid and Comet Survey (PACS), she found 32 comets, plus more than 400 asteroids. Although PACS’s objective was to find asteroids or comets that could pose a threat to civilization, the discovery of Shoemaker–Levy 9 completely overshadowed that aim. The interest generated by the comet’s impacts with Jupiter was almost as spectacular as the collisions themselves. For the first time, people the world over grappled with questions about what transpires when comets strike planets, and how these impacts might offer an insight into the origins of life on Earth.

Each observation began by loading a 15-centimetre disc of film into a plateholder, mounting it into the telescope, and exposing the film for 8 minutes. It would then be placed in a light-tight box, and a new film inserted. Our nights would be divided into sets of four, sometimes five, fields; we then repeated each exposure. At our most efficient, the time between the end of one exposure and the start of the next was as little as 90 seconds. Our nights would be divided into observations of four, sometimes five, fields of the sky; we then repeated each exposure. It was during one of these routine sessions that we recorded the two ‘discovery’ images of Shoemaker–Levy 9. When Brian G. Marsden at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics calculated that the comet was on a collision course with Jupiter, Gene thought: “In my lifetime, I am going to witness a cosmic impact.” Carolyn thought: “I am going to lose one of my comets.”

One consequence of these observations is that, since 1994, cosmic impacts have been taken seriously, and more programmes around the world are looking for comets and asteroids that could pose a threat to Earth. Other lines of research are pursuing the idea that life on Earth might have been seeded by simple organic molecules arriving from space on comets. And, parenthetically, the ‘giggle factor’ — the offhand reaction of journalists and laypeople to the idea of objects from space hitting Earth — has dissipated completely.

After the impacts, Carolyn resumed her search with PACS, along with her husband and me. Although the programme concluded at the end of December 1994, the team continued the work with two smaller Schmidt cameras at the Jarnac Observatory in Arizona. Gene was killed in a car accident in Australia in 1997. Carolyn bravely continued her work after that.

Credit : Nature 

Picture Credit : Google

Carolyn Shoemaker never set out to be a scientist. But after her three children were grown, she wanted something new to do. So at the age of 51, she started a second career and became a world-renowned astronomer. Carolyn – along with her husband Gene Shoemaker and their colleague David Levy – co-discovered comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on March 24, 1993. It was the first comet observed to be orbiting a planet – in this case, Jupiter – rather than the Sun. Jupiter's tidal forces tore the comet apart and, eventually, the fragments collided with Jupiter between July 16 and June 22, 1994.

While comet Shoemaker-Levy’s 9’s impact with Jupiter was dramatic, it was more than just a cosmic show. It gave scientists new insights into comets – and into Jupiter. The impact also was a wake-up call for scientists: If the comet had hit Earth instead of Jupiter, it could have created a global disaster. Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 helped lead to the creation of NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office.

Carolyn Shoemaker also discovered or co-discovered dozens of other comets and hundreds of asteroids. She shared the story of how she became a scientist with NASA/JPL media producer Leslie Mullen in an interview on July 22, 2019. This tribute is based largely on that interview, and the podcast episode in which the interview was featured.

Credit : NASA Solar System Exploration 

Picture Credit : Google

Carolyn Shoemaker is an American astronomer who once held the record for the most comet discoveries. By 1994, Carolyn had 32 comet discoveries to her credit, the prominent among them was the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9.Carolyn Shoemaker was born in Gallup, New Mexico in 1929. Carolyn studied history, political science, and English literature. She married Eugene Shoemaker, a geologist who was also interested in astronomy, in 1951. Her interest in astronomy and geology began only after her marriage. At the age of 51, after her children had grown up and moved out, Carolyn began helping her husband search for asteroids and comets, at California Institute of Technology, California, and the Palomar Observatory, San Diego, California. She was lauded for her exceptional eye for detail in discovering objects in near-Earth space.

Despite her relative inexperience and lack of a science degree, in 1980, Carolyn became a visiting scientist with the astrogeology branch of the United States Geological Survey Both Carolyn and Gene were on the staff of Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff Arizona

Between the 1980s and the 1990s, Shoemaker used images taken by telescopes at the Palomar Observatory to find objects which moved against the background of fixed stars Carolyn and Gene Shoemaker teamed with astronomer David H. Levy, and identified a fragmented comet orbiting Jupiter on March 24, 1993. It was named Shoemaker-Levy 9. Shoemaker-Levy 9 broke apart in July 1992 and collided with Jupiter in July 1994. It was a significant event and much-followed by scientists and enthusiasts on Earth as it provided the first direct observation of an extraterrestrial collision of Solar System objects. In 1997, Gene Shoemaker died in an accident. Carolyn, who survived with severe injuries, continued to work at the Lowell Observatory post recovery. As of 2002, Shoemaker had been credited with discovering or co-discovering 32 comets and over 800 asteroids. The Hildian asteroid 4446 Carolyn, discovered by colleague Edward Bowell at Lowell Observatory in 1985, was named in her honour.

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Charles Cretors invented the first commercial popcorn machine in 1885. Charles Cretors redesigned a peanut roaster machine after he purchased it for his confectionery shop in Decatur, Illinois but was deeply unsatisfied with how it functioned. After redesigning the peanut roaster machine for better function, he realized he was able to use it to pop popcorn. His invention marks the very first popcorn machine could pop popcorn uniformly in seasoning. Cretors moved to Chicago to sell popcorn and show off his new popcorn machine invention. When he purchased his first vendors' license to legally sell the popcorn outside of his shop on December 2nd, 1885, his company, C. Cretors & Company was born and the world of popcorn was forever changed.

His popcorn machine was run by a little steam engine, which promoted the popcorn popping process, and by 1893, he had created a popcorn machine could pop popcorn in oil. His invention was patented same year. Cretors took his popcorn machine to Chicago’s Columbian Exposition, which is now known as the World’s Fair: Columbian Exposition and introduced it to the public. He offered free samples of his hot buttered popcorn and by the time he left, people were lining up to purchase his popcorn. A traveling salesman named J. M. Savage tried Cretors product and offered to sell the steam-powered popcorn machine in his territory. Thrilled by this deal, Cretors agreed and Cretors hired his first salesman.

By 1900, Cretors invented the Special, a popcorn machine wagon drawn by horses and it became a huge success. From the success of the Special, several different versions of it were created, including one wrapped in walnut wood. As electricity was becoming more available, Cretors was the creator of the very first popcorn machine with an electrical motor. Electrical popcorn machines became more popular than their steam-powered parent and as movie attendance in the 1920s grew, so did the demand for Cretors popcorn machine. In 1988, the United States Postal Service issued a postage stamp featuring a picture of Cretors’ 1902 version of the first popcorn machine wagon as a tribute to America's first snack.

Credit : America’s Favourite Popcorn

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Alice Augusta Ball

Alice Augusta Ball (1892-1916) was an African American chemist who developed an injectable oil extract, the first successful treatment for leprosy. It was used until the 1940s. However, she did not get credit for her discovery for nearly 90 years. Some attribute this to gender and racial discrimination.

Ball was born in 1892, in Washington. Ball earned her bachelor's degree in pharmaceutical chemistry from the University of Washington, and her master's degree from the College of Hawaii (now known as the University of Hawaii), in 1915. Alice Ball was the first woman and first African American to receive a master's degree from the University of Hawaii and the first woman chemistry professor at the university. In her postgraduate research career at the University of Hawaii, Ball investigated the chemical makeup and active principle of Piper methysticum (kava - a herbal plant grown in the Pacific islands) for her master's thesis.

Impressed with her work, Dr. Harry T. Hollmann, a doctor at the Kalihi Hospital in Hawaii that treated patients with leprosy, reached out to Ball to isolate the active chemical compounds in chaulmoogra oil Chaulmoogra oil had previously been used in the treatment of leprosy with mixed results and severe side effects.

Balls succeeds

In less than a year, Ball developed a technique that would allow the oil from chaulmoogra tree seeds to become injectable and absorbable by the body. She was just 23 years old then. Her newly developed technique involved isolating ethyl ester compounds from the fatty acids of the chaulmoogra oil. This isolation technique, later known as the Ball Method, was the only pain-free treatment for leprosy available for over 30 years until sulfone drugs were introduced.

Unfortunately, Ball died in 1916, at the young age of 24, before publishing her findings. The president of the College of Hawaii, Dr. Arthur Dean, continued and published Ball's research without giving her credit for the discovery. Dean even called the treatment, "Dean Method."

Ball's name might have been completely forgotten but thanks to Dr. Hollmann, who in a 1922 medical joumal credited Ball for creating the chaulmoogra solution and referred to it as the "Ball Method. Even so, Ball remained largely forgotten until 2000, when the University of Hawaii placed a bronze plaque in front of a chaulmoogra tree on campus to honour Ball's discovery.

Inge Lehmann

Inge Lehmann (1888-1993) was a Danish seismologist who discovered that the Earth has a solid inner core inside a molten outer core. Inge Lehmann was born in Copenhagen in 1888. In 1907, she started her studies in mathematics, chemistry and physics at the University of Copenhagen, but had to drop out due to poor health. She finally completed her degree in physical science and mathematics in 1920. In 1925, Inge Lehmann became an assistant to the head of the Royal Danish Geodetic Institute. Her work involved setting up seismological observatories in Denmark and Greenland. She became interested in seismology and went on to study geodesy (the science) of making measurements related to Earth) formally at the University of Copenhagen and received her post graduation in the subject in 1928. Inge Lehmann was appointed the state geodesist and was made the head of the Seismological Department of the Royal Danish Geodetic Institute. She was responsible for running seismographic observatories in Copenhagen and Russia.

Study on Earth's core

In 1929, while examining seismograph data from a New Zealand quake, Lehmann noticed oddities in the wave patterns. The seismographs in Russia collected seismic waves with amplitudes that were higher than expected and some seismic waves travelling away from the earthquake's focus appeared to have been bent." She concluded Earth's interior must consist of a solid inner core and a liquid outer core and the waves were being refracted and reflected at the boundary between these two layers. In 1936, Lehmann published her findings in a paper.

It was not until 1970 that seismologists tested Lehmann's proposal. The boundary between the inner and outer core, which occurs at a depth of roughly 5,100 km is known as the Lehmann discontinuity. Lehmann retired from her position at the Geodetic Institute in 1953, but continued her scientific research. In 1987, aged 99, she wrote her last scientific article!

Tu Youyou

Tu Youyou is a Chinese scientist, known for her isolation of the anti-malarial substance artemisinin. She won the 2015 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine (shared with Irish-bom American parasitologist William Campbell and Japanese microbiologist Omura Satoshi). Tu was born in Ningbo, Zhejiang, China, in 1930. A tuberculosis infection at 16 interrupted her education for two years, but inspired her to pursue medical research. In 1955, Tu graduated from Beijing Medical University School of Pharmacy and continued her research on Chinese herbal medicine in the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences. After graduation, Tu worked at the Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Beijing. Project 523

Secret mission

In 1967, during the Vietnam War, North Vietnam requested China to help battle malaria, which was affecting its soldiers. Tu was appointed to lead Project 523, a secret effort to find a ticalment for malaria. Tu and her team pored over ancient Chinese medical texts to identify plants with appropriate medicinal value. The target was to remove the malaria-causing Plasmodium parasite from the blood of infected people. In 1971, after refining the extraction process, Tu and colleagues successfully isolated a nontoxic extract from sweet wormwood that effectively eliminated the Plasmodium parasite from mice and monkeys. In 1972, they isolated the active compound in the extracts, which they named qinghaosu, or artemisinin. Tu and two colleagues tested the substance on themselves before testing it on 21 patients in Hainan Province. All of them recovered. Her work was not published in English until 1979. The World Health Organisation invited Tu to present her findings on the global stage in 1981. It took two decades, but finally the WHO recommended artemisinin combination therapy as the first line of defence against malaria.

Awards

In 2011 she received the Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award for her contributions to the discovery of artemisinin. When she won the Nobel in 2015, Tu became the first Chinese Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine and the first female citizen of the People's Republic of China to receive a Nobel Prize in any category.

Maria Mitchell

Maria Mitchell (1818-1889) was an American astronomer who is known for discovering Miss Mitchell Comet. She was the first professional woman astronomer in the United States and the first woman elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Mitchell was born in Nantucket, Massachusetts in 1818. Her interest in astronomy was stimulated when her father, who was a schoolteacher and amateur astronomer, encouraged her to use his telescope independently. She also got to operate a number of astronomical instruments including chronometers, sextants, simple refracting telescopes, and Dollond telescope at a young age. In 1835, Mitchell opened her own school, where she implemented experimental teaching methods. A year later, she became Nantucket Atheneum's first librarian, where she worked till 1856. Simultaneously she was pursuing her interest in observing the night sky. As an amateur astronomer, she studied solar eclipses, the stars and the planets.

Comet discovery

In October, 1847, Mitchell discovered a comet using a Dollond refracting telescope. The comet later became known as "Miss Mitchell's Comet". During those years, the king of Denmark, King Frederick VII gave gold medals for anyone who had telescopic comet discoveries. Maria Mitchell became the first woman to receive this medal and the second woman to discover a comet (first being Caroline Herschel). After this discovery, Mitchell gained popularity worldwide and was recognised for her contribution to astronomy. Today, the official designation of this comet is C/1847 T1.

In 1849, Mitchell became a computing and field researcher for the U.S. Coast Survey. She tracked the positions and movements of planets to give sailors data for navigation.

In 1865, though Mitchell did not have a college education, she was appointed professor of astronomy at Vassar College. She became the first female professor of astronomy. She later became the director of the Vassar College Observatory and edited the astronomical column of Scientific American. Mitchell and her students began photographing sunspots in 1873 and these were the first regular photographs of the sun.

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Who is James Cook?

James Cook is a 18th century British explorer, navigator and cartographer (map-maker). He was also a captain in the British Royal Navy.

What is he famous for?

Cook is famous for three voyages between 1768 and 1779. He sailed extensively in the Pacific Ocean and the unchartered Australian coast. He is the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the on the Hawaiian Islands. He is also the first to have conducted a recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand. His detailed maps of Newfoundland are useful even today. He is said to have sailed twice around the world.

The current dispute

The Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) claims that the wreck known as RI 2394 in Newport Harbour, Rhode Island belongs to the Endeavour. But the U.S. partners from the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP) say claim is "premature and a "breach of contract.

The Australian museum says the structural details and shape of the remains "closely match historic plans of Endeavour and that its timber samples strongly suggested it was built in Europe and not America. But the RIMAP says that many unanswered questions remained.

Backgrounder

The British-built coal ship famously landed in eastern Australia in 1770. The Endeavour, which the British explorer sailed in, in a voyage to Australia and New Zealand between 1768 and 1771, was scuttled in Newport Harbour during the American War of Independence. The Endeavour, then known as Lord Sandwich II, was sunk in 1778 with 12 other ships off Rhode Island, U.S. but no-one was sure where

Did you know?

Named after Cook

• The Apollo 15 Command/Service Module Endeavour was named after Cook's ship, HMS Endeavour.
• Another shuttle, Discovery, was also named after his HMS Discovery.
• James Cook University, was the first institution of higher education in North Queensland, Australia.
• Cook Islands, the Cook Strait, Cook Inlet, and even the Cook crater on the Moon!
• Aoraki/Mount Cook is the highest summit in New Zealand.
• Mount Cook, on the border between the U.S. and Canada.
• A life-size statue of the explorer can be found in a park in central Sydney.

Picture Credit : Google

Who is James Cook?

James Cook is a 18th century British explorer, navigator and cartographer (map-maker). He was also a captain in the British Royal Navy.

What is he famous for?

Cook is famous for three voyages between 1768 and 1779. He sailed extensively in the Pacific Ocean and the unchartered Australian coast. He is the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the on the Hawaiian Islands. He is also the first to have conducted a recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand. His detailed maps of Newfoundland are useful even today. He is said to have sailed twice around the world.

The current dispute

The Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM) claims that the wreck known as RI 2394 in Newport Harbour, Rhode Island belongs to the Endeavour. But the U.S. partners from the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP) say claim is "premature and a "breach of contract.

The Australian museum says the structural details and shape of the remains "closely match historic plans of Endeavour and that its timber samples strongly suggested it was built in Europe and not America. But the RIMAP says that many unanswered questions remained.

Backgrounder

The British-built coal ship famously landed in eastern Australia in 1770. The Endeavour, which the British explorer sailed in, in a voyage to Australia and New Zealand between 1768 and 1771, was scuttled in Newport Harbour during the American War of Independence. The Endeavour, then known as Lord Sandwich II, was sunk in 1778 with 12 other ships off Rhode Island, U.S. but no-one was sure where

Did you know?

Named after Cook

• The Apollo 15 Command/Service Module Endeavour was named after Cook's ship, HMS Endeavour.
• Another shuttle, Discovery, was also named after his HMS Discovery.
• James Cook University, was the first institution of higher education in North Queensland, Australia.
• Cook Islands, the Cook Strait, Cook Inlet, and even the Cook crater on the Moon!
• Aoraki/Mount Cook is the highest summit in New Zealand.
• Mount Cook, on the border between the U.S. and Canada.
• A life-size statue of the explorer can be found in a park in central Sydney.

Picture Credit : Google

Isotopes are an indispensable part of science today. For even though the periodic table is only made up of more than 100 elements, they constitute over 3,000 nuclides – when we include the isotopes and their different nuclear energy states. This wide playing field amounts to plenty of scientific activity, resulting in a whole lot of benefits, and drawbacks, that have stemmed out of it.

Works with Rutherford, Ramsay

The person who gave us the term “isotope” is Frederick Soddy. Born in Eastbourne, England in 1877, Soddy was the youngest son of Benjamin and Hannah Soddy. Educated at private schools, Soddy went on to attend Eastbourne College, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth and the University of Oxford, graduating with first class honours. Working as a research assistant at Oxford till 1900, Soddy then spent a couple of years at the McGill University in Canada. It was here that he got to work on radioactivity and the disintegration of radioactive elements along with physicist Sir Ernest Rutherford, apart from serving as a lecturer in Chemistry. He followed it up with two years at the University College, London, where he had the opportunity to work with chemist Sir William Ramsay.

He spent ten years at the University of Glasgow from 1904, during which time he served as a lecturer in physical chemistry and radioactivity, apart from completing some of his most important research works.

Develops Displacement Law

Soddy first developed the Displacement Law by collaborating with his lab assistant Alexander Fleck. According to this law, an element moves to a different position in the periodic table when an alpha or beta ray is emitted.

Next up, he formulated the concept of chemically non- separable radioactive elements. And a chance occurrence led him to coin the term that defined elements with the same number of protons (atomic number), but different number of neutrons (atomic mass).

“At the same place”

Attending a dinner party in his father-in-law’s house, Soddy explained his theory that several elements on the periodic table appeared to occupy the same place. In attendance at that time was Dr. Margaret Todd, a physician distantly related to Soddy. Like many other educated Brits of the time, Todd had learnt some Greek. She suggested to Soddy that he call these elements “isotope”, Greek for “at the same place”. On February 18, 1913, Soddy first used the term “isotope” to define elements that were indistinguishable and inseparable chemically, but existed in forms that differed in atomic weight.

While Soddy initially defined isotopes in terms of radioactivity, he was later able to demonstrate that even non-radioactive elements could have isotopes. Isotopes enabled scientists to understand the relationships among families of elements, allowing for numerous developments based on it.

Soddy grows pessimistic

Even though Soddy continued to be involved in academics, he moved away from his study of radioactivity and became actively involved in economic and social issues. Despite winning the 1921 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work, he was greatly disillusioned by the time he died in 1956, as he was of the opinion that isotopes had been employed ruthlessly to kill people, rather than fulfill its promise in promoting peaceful applications.

A range of applications

While Soddy didn’t live to see it, isotopes have been put to positive use in the decades that followed. From nuclear power, mass spectroscopy, radiometric dating and nuclear medicine, we have only scratched the surface till now when it comes to employing isotopes. Without doubt, isotopes will be put to more and more uses in the years to follow. We can only hope that more good than bad comes out of it.

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In 1908, as the head of the pathology department at the Imperial Wilhelminen Hospital in Vienna, Landsteiner showed that polio is a viral disease. Together with his assistant Erwin Popper, Landsteiner conducted an autopsy of a boy who had died of polio. To determine whether bacteria or a different agent had caused the polio, Landsteiner collected some of the boy's spinal fluid and strained it through a filter fine enough to trap bacteria. He then cultured this filtered particles and found that no bacteria grew there. To determine if the infected spinal fluid material was infectious, Landsteiner injected it into rabbits, mice, and guinea pigs, but none of the animals became sick. Landsteiner and Popper injected the filtered spinal fluid into two Old World rhesus monkeys (http://eol.org/pages/327960/overviewMacaca mulatta), and they found that both died within two weeks. Landsteiner performed autopsies on the rhesus monkeys that revealed spinal cord lesions like those observed in human polio victims. Because Landsteiner and Popper had eliminated bacteria as a potential cause of the infection earlier in the experiment, they concluded that a virus must have caused the infection. Landsteiner proposed that it could be possible to create a polio vaccine. However, it took forty-seven years until Jonas Salk at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, developed and successfully administered the polio vaccine in 1952.

During World War I, Landsteiner performed blood transfusions on many injured soldiers. In 1916 and at the age of forty-eight, Landsteiner met and married Leopoldine Helene Wlatso. A year later, they had to their only child, Ernst. Because of economic difficulties in post-war Austria, Landsteiner and his family moved to Netherlands in 1919. Landsteiner soon obtained a job at the Catholic R.K. Hospital in The Hauge, Netherlands, performing routine tests on urine and blood. During his stay in the Netherlands, he published twelve papers about immune responses triggered by changes in small fat or sugar molecules.

In 1923, the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in New York City, New York, offered Landsteiner a position to research immunity and allergies. Landsteiner accepted and moved with his family to the US. Most biographers report that Landsteiner's move to the US was very difficult for him. He disliked the fame that came with his status as an authority on immunology and avoided invitations to speak publicly, preferring instead to stay in his laboratory. Landsteiner became a US citizen in 1929, and he won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1930.

Credit : The Embryo Project

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In 1897, Landsteiner accepted a position at the Institute of Pathological Anatomy in Vienna, where he worked on cadavers. Over the next ten years he performed nearly four thousand post-mortem examinations and published over seventy-five articles on his observations. Fifty-two of these articles discuss blood chemistry. Landsteiner described the agglutination reactions that occur when blood from one individual is brought into contract with the blood of another individual. Landsteiner relegated his observation of agglutination to a footnote in a paper he wrote in 1900, but he expanded upon this observation the following year in his paper "Agglutination of Normal Human Blood."

Landsteiner observed a pattern of antigen reactions that occurred when he combined blood serum from different individuals. Landsteiner observed that antigens on the outside of blood cells differed between individuals. If blood from what he called the A or the B group was introduced into a host of the opposing group, the host body would trigger an immunological reaction. Landsteiner found that this reaction caused the invading antigen carrying blood cell to burst. Large accumulations of burst cells created clumps that could clog small blood vessels (capillaries) and perhaps cause shock or death. Initially, Landsteiner recognized three different blood types: A, B, and C. The C-blood type was later more commonly called type-O. In 1902, one of Landsteiner's students found a fourth blood type, AB, which triggered a reaction if introduced into either A or B blood. In 1930, The Health Committee of the League of Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, formally adopted the Landsteiner nomenclature (A, B, AB, and O) in his honor, the naming convention that was still used up through the first decades of the twenty-first century.

Landsteiner's blood typing system had an immediate impact on forensic and surgical sciences. In 1902, Landsteiner and Max Richter, who worked at Vienna University Institute of Forensic Medicine in Vienna, described a method of using blood evidence gathered from the scene of a crime to aid in the investigation. Using this system, scientists could determine whether a blood sample contained A-antigen, B-antigen, both A- and B-antigen, or neither antigen (type-O). If a suspect's blood had a different antigen than the sample left at the crime scene, investigators could conclude the sample could was not from that particular individual. However, roughly fifty percent of the population has O-type blood and less than five percent has AB-type blood. So, if a sample and a suspect had matching blood types, investigators could not make a positive identification. The ABO system also enabled doctors to perform safe blood transfusions. Reuben Ottenberg at the Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York, New York, completed the first successful blood transfusion based on Landsteiner's blood type theory in 1907. During World War I, blood transfusions saved tens of thousands of lives. Later, the ABO blood grouping made it possible to successfully complete the first organ transplants by reducing the chance that a body rejected incompatible transplants.

Credit : The Embryo Project

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Karl Landsteiner was an Austrian American pathologist who discovered the major blood groups in 1900. His other works related to blood have made blood transfusion a safe medical practice. Karl Landsteiner was born in Vienna in 1868. Landsteiner studied medicine at the University of Vienna, graduating in 1891. The next five years. Landsteiner worked with notable scientists such as Arthur Hantzsch, Emil Fischer and Eugen Bamberger to gain knowledge of chemistry. In 1897, he returned to the University of Vienna, where he pursued his interest in the emerging field of immunology. In 1900, Landsteiner published a paper attributing agglutination, a clumping reaction in red blood cells, to immunity. Though scientists knew about agglutination, which occurs when the blood of one person is brought into contact with that of another, the underlying mechanism of this phenomenon was not understood. Landsteiner discovered that this was due to immunological reaction that occurs when antibodies are produced by the host against donated blood cells. Landsteiner observed that antigens on the outside of blood cells differed between individuals. This led Landsteiner to identify three such antigens, which he labelled A, B, and C (later changed to O). A fourth blood type, later named AB, was identified by one of his students in 1902.

Landsteiner also found out that blood transfusion between persons with the same blood group did not lead to the destruction of blood cells. Based on his findings, the first successful blood transfusion was performed in New York in 1907. In 1930 Landsteiner was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in recognition of these achievements. He is, in fact, recognised as the father of transfusion medicine Landsteiner also discovered other blood factors during his career-the M. N. and P factors, which he identified in 1927 with Philip Levine, and the Rhesus (Rh) system, in 1940 with Alexander Wiener.

Discovery of Polio virus

In 1908, Karl Landsteiner and Erwin Popper announced that the infectious agent in polio was a virus. Landsteiner also helped identify the microorganisms responsible for syphilis.

He received the Aronson Prize in 1926. He was posthumously awarded the Lasker Award in 1946.

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Yes, there is a rare species of tree snail named after the late Steve Irwin, a famous Australian wildlife enthusiast. Called Crikey steveinvini, the tree snail was discovered in 2009 in Queensland. The scientists named it in his honour, as its shell was khaki in colour, like the signature outfit of Irwin.

The snail was found in the mountainous regions of north Queensland's wet tropics, near Cairns.

"This is an extremely rare species of snail," Dr Stanisic said.

"So far it has only been found in three locations, all on the summits of high mountains in far north Queensland and at altitudes above 1,000 metres, which is quite unusual for Australian land snails.

"These mountainous habitats will be among the first to feel the effects of climate change and Steve Irwin's tree snail could become a focal species for monitoring this change."

The scientist described crikey steveirwini as "a colourful snail, with swirling bands of creamy yellow, orange-brown and chocolate giving the shell an overall khaki appearance".

"It was the khaki colour that immediately drew the connection to the late Crocodile Hunter," Dr Stanisic said.

Terri Irwin says her husband would have been delighted to have a new species bear his name and signature catch-cry.

"Steve worked tirelessly to promote conservation, wildlife and the environment and his work enabled the plight of endangered species to reach a whole new audience," Ms Irwin said.

"Steve also had a long history of collaborating with staff at the Queensland Museum and I'm sure he would be pleased to know his name is continuing to highlight a rare and endangered Queensland species."

Credit :  ABC News 

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