The Scientific Discovery of the Year.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XL, Issue 7534, 7 May 1903, Page 3

The Scientific Discovery of the Year.

1 do not think I could explain in a way that would be understood by the ordinary iMiblie how I made the scientific discovery for which I have just been awarded tlfe Nobel prize, said Major Ronald Ross., C.8., F.R.S., to the writer, at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine the other day.

However, I shall bo happy to give you any information you may consider of interest to your readers. Of course., you know all about tho Nobel prizes. They "™ nvo in number, of the value of about £7800 ■->ach J -md are awarded annually to tho 1..v persons who. during the preceding twelve months, arc judged to have contributed most to human progress in tho om,llm °. f literature as- well as science. The prize awarded to me was, as you know, that for medicine, and I appreciate it- all the more because it is a recognition <it woik already accomplished. It would be ot great assistance to science if som* such prize were established in this country.

It is about ten years since I first took un tho study of malaria. I was led to do so by ever-increasing doubts n-uent tho tlieor- that it had its oiigin in the soil At that time I had been eleven years in the. Indian Medical Service, and two ve-irs later—namdy, j n 1894—1 determined to tako advantage of mv presence in India to conduct an experimental investigation of tho idea of Manson and Layeran that mosquitoes had something to do with U<e propagation of the disease.

Fom teen years -previously Lavoran had discovered the malaria parasite in human blood, which suggested to him that the mosquito might be responsible for itsintroduction there. An American scientist named Kins.' had in 1883 expressed the same -opinion in a paper on the subject; and tho sime idea emanated from Professor Koch in tho year 1884. Whilu in England on leave in 1894 I met Dr Patrick Mr.nson. of the London J^cnool of Tropical Medicine, and I was greatly influenced by his views in resol.--mg to pub the mosquito theory to the tost of exhaustive investigaiou. I began my experiments by feeding mosquitoes on person* suffering from malaria and watching tor the appearance of the germ in the 4 insects

Tho difficulties I had to contend with wore simply enormous. You may not be aware that there are hundreds of' different lands of mosquitoes, and I did not know in winch to look for the partite or how I was to identify it. But for two and a halt years I continued - investigations with the result that, while my knowledge oi rur-. mos-quito became extensive and peculiar. 1 was still without any clue to the parasite of which I was insearch. Then I one day happened to secure what was to me a new kind of mosquito—that now known to science as Anopheles—and having fed it in the same wav a<= the other*, put it under the microscope for minute examination. This at. first, revealed nohing. and I began to feel that, after tho many hundreds of mosquitoes I had examined. I should have tc give up the task and abandon the theory of mosquitotransmission of malaria.

On taking another look at the insect. however. I detected something o:i the wall oi" its stomach which was absent from all other mosquitoes I had examined. But the significance of my discovery did not dawn upon me until" I awoke "from my slumbers next morning, when the conviction forced itself upon y mind th;;t I had now found tho object of my long-continu-ed search.

Removal from malaria-infected districts IHC-vcntcd Al.-ijoi- Ross from pursuing hi s invwtigatioi;-:: for some months, but by working on the malaria, of birds, which resemble?, closely the malaria, of human beings, he tniimatdv succeeded in tracing tliL« life-history of the malaria warasite in the mosquito. Takfcg twenty-eight healthy sparrows to experiment upon he infected twenty-two by feeding an infc.t.'d nuwquito upon them. Demonstration could scarcely go farther than this; and having thus' established the theory of Maiison and Lavcran and transferred it to t-ho region of asceitained fact, tho persevering scier.f:Vt published tha result, of his investigations to tiie world. Thy importance of his discoveiy was recognised by the dispatch of special commissions from the Royal Society to India and elsewhere, which" co-(iimad it in all respects. coiTciboration also being forthcoming frov various European countries. As with so ninny others who. have endeavoured to penetrate into the unknown, success came, to Maior Ross -when failure after failure h.-.d disheartened and discouraged him. To study a mosquito under a microscope- is a monotonous occupation, but. when lhe> study extends to hundreds the monotony is correspondingly increased.

And as regards each mosquito examined by the Xobel prize-winner there was so much of it to examine and to watch that tho scientist might, easily have lost heart. Under it, nveroseope used by Major Ross to magnify malaria, parasites, a mosquito

appears as large, as a hippopotamus, while under a, still more powerful instrument it looks larger than an elephant! It was in 1899 that Mai or Ross; became connected with tho Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. coming there from India to take up the position of lecturer. He had not been in Liverpool long when ho was sent to the west coast of Africa to , found the species of mosquito which comcontinuo. his investigations, where he found the species of mosquito which communicate the deadly African fever, discovered their breeding places, and devised means for greatly mitigating the terrible scourge, of malaria.