Name William Rutherford Role Physiologist | Died February 21, 1899 | |
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Books Outlines of practical histology | ||
Education University of Edinburgh | ||
William Rutherford (20 April 1839, Ancrum Craig, Roxburghshire – 21 February 1899, 14 Douglas Crescent, Edinburgh) was a Scottish physician and physiologist who was Professor of Physiology at Edinburgh University for 25 years, and contributed to the development of experimental physiology. He was Fullerian Professor of Physiology and Comparative Anatomy from 1872–75.
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Life
William Rutherford was born at Ancrum in Roxburghshire. After studying in Berlin, Vienna, and Paris, he became assistant to John Hughes Bennett, Professor of Physiology at Edinburgh. After the Edinburgh anatomist John Goodsir told Rutherford about the new experimental physiology in Germany, William Rutherford and the ophthalmologist Argyll Robertson at Edinburgh became the first in the United Kingdom to introduce the new experimental apparatus of Hermann von Helmholtz, Emil du Bois-Reymond and Carl Ludwig.
In 1869 Rutherford became Asst. Professor of Physiology at King's College, London. In 1871 he was appointed Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution In 1874 he returned to Edinburgh University to succeed Bennett as Professor of Physiology there.
Rutherford lectured at the University of Edinburgh when Arthur Conan Doyle studied medicine there. Like his fictional character Sherlock Holmes, who was based on a real person, Conan Doyle's Professor Challenger was based on Rutherford.
He died 21 February 1899 at 114 Douglas Crescent, Edinburgh and his body was buried at Ancrum.