Johannes Müller

JOHANNES MÜLLER (1801–1858), a major German naturalist and pathological anatomist; one of the most outstanding scientists of the mid-19th century. Born in Koblenz into a family.

De generatione foetus commentatio.

Upon graduating from the university, he worked as an assistant at the department of anatomy and embryology; in 1824 he became a private docent, and in 1826 he was elected professor of anatomy in Bonn. In 1833 he moved to Berlin, where he took the position of professor of anatomy and physiology, as well as director of the anatomical theater of the anatomical-zoological museum at the University of Berlin. Müller's activity was very diverse, which is evident from the fact that at the University of Berlin he conducted work and gave lectures on anatomy, physiology, embryology, comparative anatomy, paleontology, general pathology, and pathological anatomy. In each of these disciplines, he contributed a great deal of value, both in terms of methodology and in the sense of discovering new and extremely important facts. The total number of scientific works published by Müller exceeds 260; the most important of them are: in the field of anatomy—a description of the musculature of the perineum, the structure of erectile organs, and the discovery of the nodes of the sympathetic nervous system. In histology, despite the imperfection of the microscopes of that time, Müller managed to provide extremely accurate descriptions of the structure of the notochord, cartilage, bone, connective tissue, and kidneys. In the field of embryology, Müller was the first to describe in detail a human embryo of an early period, clarified the process of fetal respiration, and discovered those embryonic ducts which were subsequently named the "Müllerian ducts" in his honor. In the field of comparative anatomy, of which Müller is one of the founders, he produced valuable observations on the organs of vision and the sympathetic nervous system of invertebrates, made the discovery of so-called lymph hearts in amphibians and gills in amphibian larvae, and provided a whole series of studies on the systematics of fish, amphibians, birds, and echinoderms. In the field of physiology, Müller is credited with: the first exposition of the doctrine of reflexes, valuable studies on the physiology of the sense organs, and on the physiology of the human vocal apparatus. In addition, Müller produced a number of works on physiological chemistry, which was in its infancy at that time, in particular on the chemistry of lymph, blood, and cartilage (Müller discovered chondrin). In the field of pathological anatomy, Müller was the first to widely apply the microscope to the study of pathologically altered organs and tissues. Müller published few printed works on pathological anatomy; among them, one can note a study on bone inflammation and a capital work on the finest structure and forms of tumors. In the latter work, which remained unfinished, Müller was the first to speak about the cellular structure of tumors and, based on a comparison of the structure and course of tumors, outlined a classification of neoplasms that, in general terms, coincides with the modern subdivision of tumors. The content of Müller's lectures on pathological anatomy, known from the preserved notes of his students, is very interesting; in these lectures, which touched in particular on inflammation, degeneration, atrophy, concretions, tuberculosis, tumors, as well as diseases of individual organs, the milestones of cellular pathology are undoubtedly already outlined, which were later brilliantly developed by Virchow, who, just like the founder of the cell theory, Schwann, was a student and assistant of Müller. Müller published a major textbook on physiology ("Handbuch der Physiologie des Menschen", Vol. I-II, Coblenz, 1833-44), which went through four editions, and founded the journal "Archiv für Anatomie, Physiologie u. Wissenschaftliche Medizin" (Leipzig-Halle), which was published from 1834-76 under Müller's editorship. In 1844-48, Müller served as rector of the University of Berlin.