Historical profile The chemist who saved biology A long voyage led one young chemist to steer evolutionary biology onto the right course. Richard Corfield explores the life of chemistry’s Darwin

In short  John Young Buchanan was the sole chemist aboard HMS Challenger – a ship that spent four years studying the world’s oceans  Previously seafaring scientific studies had mistakenly identified a substance on the seabed as a primitive organism that colonised the ocean floor throughout the globe  Buchanan was responsible for uncovering this mistake, which could otherwise have seriously damaged the acceptance of evolutionary biology

John Young Buchanan MUSEUM HISTORY NATURAL

56 | Chemistry World | February 2008 www.chemistryworld.org 135 years ago, a small steam and sail would be used to collect the samples. corvette slipped her moorings from Attached to this, at intervals, were the quayside in the bustling UK naval thermometers for measuring the city of Portsmouth and set out on thermal structure of the ocean, and one of history’s most extraordinary remote-controlled flasks for taking voyages of scientific discovery. HMS samples at different depths. At the NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM HISTORY NATURAL Challenger had been tasked – via an end of the sounding line was a device unlikely collaboration of the British for retrieving sediment samples Navy and the Royal Society – to from the seafloor itself. perform the first detailed study of It was essential to use steam the world’s oceans. power while dredging and sounding, The voyage had four specific because only with a consistent push objectives. The first was to from the propeller could the attitude investigate the physical conditions and position of the ship be kept of the deep in the great ocean constant. Under sail she would drift basins – as far as the neighbourhood miles off-station, but with the steam of the Great Southern Ice Barrier engine churning and her bow head- – with regard to depth, temperature, on into the sea, enough way could be circulation, specific gravity, and put on to achieve a stable position penetration of light. Secondly, it from which the sounding line could sought to determine the chemical be run out. composition of seawater at various depths – the organic matter in The crucible of time solution, and the particles in Buchanan’s greatest contribution suspension. Thirdly, it would to the voyage, and to the history attempt to ascertain the physical of biology as a whole, was his and chemical character of deep- debunking of a theory that could sea deposits and the sources of have done as much damage these deposits. And finally, it would to the science as Lysenkoism investigate the distribution of life – Trofim Lysenko’s doctrine that at different depths and on the deep characteristics acquired during life seafloor. could be inherited – had done to Along with the usual complement Soviet biology during Stalin’s reign of naval ratings and officers, the as Soviet leader in the mid Challenger carried a scientific crew instruments and skilled in the art Specimen jars brought 20th century. of five to undertake these Herculean of glass blowing – something that back to the UK aboard But the cast of characters tasks: Charles Wyville-Thomson, was likely to be in great demand on HMS Challenger behind Buchanan’s story were a emeritus professor of zoology at a naval vessel braving some of the great deal more wholesome than the University of , UK; roughest waters in the world. Lysenko. They were all passionately John Murray, a fiery tempered He was a kind and very sincere concerned to advance the theory and outspoken Canadian who was man, but so painfully shy that his that had then only recently to become the most famous of all warm often remained hidden. rocked the Victorian world to its Challenger scientists as the lead When he did form friendships they foundations – ’s author of the massive 50-volume were deep and long-lasting. This theory of by means of tome that eventually ‘summarised’ was the case when he met the young . their findings; Henry Moseley, German, von Suhm, who was feeling By the middle years of the 1860s a young natural historian from very alone and overwhelmed when the foundations of the theory were the University of Oxford, UK; he joined Challenger at the end of in place and central to all of them Rudolf von Willemoes-Suhm, a November 1872. was the notion of progress from German naturalist who joined Like Moseley, Buchanan was eager simple forms to those of increasingly the expedition at the last minute; to establish a well-equipped, on- greater complexity. So mammals John Wild, Wyville Thomson’s board laboratory. Consequently, one were more advanced than reptiles, secretary and the expedition artist; of the gun bays on the main deck was which were in turn more advanced and the most enigmatic, but one converted into a tiny physical and than amphibians, which were of the most crucial of the group, a chemical laboratory for his use. This more advanced than fish and so Scottish chemist named John Young marvel of miniaturisation managed on. This reasoning covered not Buchanan. to contain the paraphernalia of a only the vertebrates, but all of the At twenty-nine years of age, traditional Victorian chemistry invertebrates and single celled Buchanan had come to science laboratory – retorts, stills, test tubes, protozoa. Between all of these relatively late, having started a hydrometers, thermometers, blow- ‘Buchanan laid ‘grades’ of animal organisation degree in to read arts pipes – all held neatly in place by it was thought there must be before discovering a deep-seated ingenious devices to counteract the to rest a theory transitional forms with intermediate love of chemistry. After studying motion of the ship. that could characteristics – so-called ‘missing on the Continent he returned to The purpose of the chemistry links’. Scotland to work with Crum Brown, lab was to analyse the seawater have seriously The champions of the theory the noted professor of chemistry and sediment samples that would damaged were Darwin’s tenacious defender at the . be brought up during the course Thomas Henry Huxley, professor Buchanan was a superbly practical of the expedition. A sounding line, evolutionary of geology at the Royal School of chemist, capable of making his own made of a rope of woven piano wire, biology’ Mines in the UK and Ernst Haeckle www.chemistryworld.org Chemistry World | February 2008 | 57 Historical profile in Germany. Both believed implicitly by the 1860s Huxley was the pre- ‘Huxley quickly installed Bathybius as the that this notion of progression eminent practising natural historian centrepiece of his evolutionary extended to the simplest forms of life in the Victorian Empire; a natural concluded that theorising. Huxley though was and indeed beyond – that there must foil to Darwin’s brilliant theorising. this was the cautious about claiming too much be a missing link between complex Huxley’s analysis of the sediment for the new organism. Unlike chemicals and simple organisms, or samples sent back by these dredging most primitive Haeckle, for example he never to put it another way, between non- ships showed an amorphous, organism ever endorsed the idea that Bathybius was life and life. translucent mass in the bottom of formed by spontaneous generation the bottles that seemed to move discovered of living tissue from non-living Primordial error on its own accord in an amoeboid – the ultimate organic compounds. And Huxley By the late 1860s the ships tasked fashion. Microscopical analysis was never quite able to accept with sounding the abyssal depths of the materials showed that it organic Haeckle’s proposition that Bathybius for the telegraph cables that would was peppered with tiny plates of ancestor’ was the missing link between the bind the elements of British Empire material that looked organic. When living and the non-living. together had been on the move for stained with carmine, the entire Despite Huxley’s reservations, about two decades. They were often mass seemed to show clear evidence by the end of the 1860s Bathybius instructed to preserve the samples of organic origins. To Huxley the was installed as the hottest thing of the seabed they dredged up in conclusion was obvious: here was in evolutionary biology. Regardless alcohol, and return them to a shore- the most primitive organism ever of whether it was the missing link based lab for analysis when they discovered – the ultimate original between life and non-life, the fact returned to land. In the middle of the ancestor. He wrote to his friend that it had been found in sediments 19th century, shore-based sediment and colleague Ernst Haeckle telling globally implied strongly that it analysis labs were in short supply him of the discovery and that he was a single superorganism that and much of the material went had named the organism Bathybius encircled the globe on the sea-floor. to Huxley’s laboratory in Jermyn haecklii in honour of the famous Street, , for analysis. Even German evolutionist. Dredging for clues those samples that didn’t would not Haeckle was delighted with This then was the situation have escaped his notice because Huxley’s new organism and when HMS Challenger departed Lab on a ship The instruments in the miniaturised laboratory were marvels of Victorian ingenuity. Maximum and minimum thermometers used to measure the temperatures in the long drop to the sea bottom were heavily armoured against the crushing pressure of the deep ocean. They consisted of a U-tube filled with mercury attached to a bulb containing creosote. Expansion or contraction of the creosote moved the mercury around in the two arms, pushing a small spring-loaded metal index in front of it. The base of each index – the end nearest the mercury – stayed in place as the mercury moved away, preserving the highest and lowest temperatures. Although the bulbs were enclosed in a second bulb full of alcohol to compensate for variations in pressure, the accuracy of this compensation was unknown. Also, the long journey through

the water column and the fact that temperature MUSEUM HISTORY NATURAL did not decrease in a straightforward manner The gun bay laboratory: a marvel of miniaturisation with depth meant that measurements were not necessarily accurate. The line was routinely water when the line was hauled upward. increased proportional to the drag of the deployed a second time. Sediment sampling apparatus dangled line. When the time taken for the fathom Water-sampling flasks were of two varieties: at the end of the rope to retrieve a sample of markers to pay out departed from this precise one for bottom waters and the other to take the seafloor. The crew had to know when the relationship – the winch man had a book samples at shallower depths. The bottom-water sounding line had reached bottom, but once the of tables that informed him – the bottom of sampler was a slender reinforced rod with brass line was in the water there was no way of telling the ocean had been reached. The crew then disks at either end. A sleeve above the upper disc whether it was vertical beneath the ship’s keel pulled in the line, carefully read and noted the was attached to a lanyard, which disengaged a or drifting off at an angle under the influence of thermometer readings, sent the water flask clutch when the bottom was reached, allowing a current. To answer this problem the sounding down to Buchanan’s physical laboratory where the sleeve to slide down the rod and trap a wire was calibrated in 25-fathom increments: its specific gravity and other physical properties sample of bottom water between the two discs. 100-fathom marks being blue, 50-fathom were measured, and sent the contents of the The intermediate water sampler was similar but marks red, and the 25- and 75-fathom marks sounding rod to the natural history laboratory had two-valved stopcocks at the top and bottom white. where the composition of the ocean floor was through which water flowed as the device As the line was fed out, the time taken for noted and the sediment or rock sample dried and descended, but which snapped shut, trapping successive markers to pass over the side bottled.

58 | Chemistry World | February 2008 www.chemistryworld.org NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM HISTORY NATURAL

Portsmouth in December 1872. wrote later, ‘I looked at the matter HMS Challenger had been working according to the Wyville-Thomson, the leader of the from a different point of view from directions given by the discoverers expedition, harboured reservations that of the naturalists.’ Buchanan of Bathybius, had actually observed about Bathybius. He had noted in decided that he would evaporate a substance like coagulated mucus his classic book The Depths of the fresh samples of water from the sea which answered in every particular, Sea that not all of the descriptions of bottom, to see if an organic residue except the want of motion, to the Bathybius’ physical appearance were was left behind. After several weeks description of the organism.’ In in agreement. Despite this reticence, intensive labour his search had fact, Murray had found so much of however, Thomson still believed drawn a blank. Once the seawater the material that he and Buchanan that some form of primitive creature had evaporated, there was nothing concluded that there was no way it lived in the abyssal environment. left but a barely perceptible greyish would not show up in Buchanan’s This was the unsung touchstone tinge ‘without any other signs of tests. which underpinned the whole carbonisation or burning.’ Challenger enterprise – if the bottom At the same time Murray had Set the record straight of the ocean was, as it appeared, a been attacking the problem from Bathybius haecklii – the By the time Challenger docked at dark unchanging vastness, then the a different, more biological angle. amorphous cause of Yokohama, Japan, in the spring relentless evolutionary pressures ‘Mr Murray,’ wrote Buchanan, ‘who much confusion of 1875 Buchanan’s own chemical that drove organisms on land and in investigations and Murray’s surface waters would not exist and observations had crystallised life would be primitive in this silent into a certainty: ‘There remained landscape. but one conclusion, namely that During the first three years of the the body which Mr Murray had four year voyage the Challenger observed was not an organic body scientists looked every day for at all; and on examining it and its Huxley’s beloved Bathybius. mode of preparation, I determined Not once in all that time did they it to be sulfate of lime, which had discover it in the fresh samples that been eliminated from the seawater, came up on the massive hemp lines always present in the mud, as an from the depths of the sea. Even amorphous precipitate on the when they sampled the deepest part addition of spirits of wine. The of the world ocean – that part of the substance, when analysed, consisted Marianas Trench that, at seven miles of sulfuric acid and lime; and when straight down, would come to be dissolved in water and the solution known eventually as the Challenger allowed to evaporate, it crystallised Deep – they drew a blank. in the well known form of gypsum…’ The diffident Buchanan, after It fell to Wyville-Thomson to three years of this continuing failure, communicate the news to the doyen decided to try a different approach. of Victorian natural history in his ‘As chemist of the expedition,’ he Jermyn Street lair. www.chemistryworld.org Chemistry World | February 2008 | 59 Historical profile

1872/1873 1874 1875 1876 SCOTT OLLINGTON SCOTT

He wrote to Huxley on June 9 The four year voyage of lurking in the stack rooms of any his house in Park Lane, London 1875: ‘None of us have been able to HMS Challenger self-respecting university with an (the Edinburgh residence having see a trace of Bathybius…’ He then interest in . Buchanan, been sold in 1899) and moved to explained Murray and Buchanan’s though, after he had written up his Havana, Cuba. In the spring of observations and mentioned that section of the report, disengaged 1915 he moved on to Boston in the they were anxious to present the himself from further work with the US and remained there until the findings as soon as possible before Challenger scientists. Armistice was declared. Returning the next British Association meeting. In 1889 he accepted the offer to London after the war he took Huxley, a man of great integrity, of a lectureship at the University a couple of rooms in a West End immediately capitulated. Without of Cambridge, but held it for only hotel. He had a sailor’s dislike of delay he published a portion of four years. With his substantial clutter and by the end of his life, his Wyville-Thomson’s letter in Nature private income he had no need youthful enthusiasm transformed to adding ‘Prof. Thomson speaks very of a university stipend and a profound pessimism by the ravages guardedly and does not consider apparently felt constrained by of war, he had reduced his worldly the fate of Bathybius to be as yet the administrative requirements goods to only that which would fit absolutely decided. But since I am of the position. He continued to within a couple of travelling trunks. mainly responsible for the mistake… hold rooms in Christ’s College, He died in 1925, leaving behind a of introducing this singular Cambridge for twenty years and considerable personal fortune. substance into the list of living was valued as a genial member Buchanan, the man who saved things, I think I shall err on the right of the senior combination room. Darwinian biology from making a side in attaching even greater weight But in 1893 he resigned his fool of itself, remains an enigma. than he does to the view which he lectureship and, for the remainder But those who knew him as a man suggests.’ of the century, continued his thought highly of him. Nowhere Haeckle was less willing to forfeit oceanographic research from his is this better expressed than in an organism that had been named in two private labs in London and his obituary in the Royal Society’s his honour and continued to publish Edinburgh and aboard various Proceedings of 1926, ‘He was not a on Bathybius for several years. But dredging ships and the private yacht man who made friends very readily, the notion of Bathybius faded from of his close personal friend Prince and he certainly did not wear his serious discussion about Darwin’s Albert I of Monaco. Together the heart on his sleeve. But once a friend theory, and Huxley never mentioned two sailed the seven through you were always a friend, for he it again. the end of the Victorian era and into was a man whose quality of heart After the voyage was completed the Edwardian. equalled the quality of his brain.’ Challenger’s scientific and naval But from the 1890s onwards crew rapidly dispersed. Wyville- ‘None of us have Buchanan’s health deteriorated Richard Corfield is a freelance science Thomson and Murray concentrated been able to and in 1912 he suffered a nervous writer based in Oxford and author of on writing up the ‘Initial Report’ breakdown. Sensitive to a fault, the The Silent Landscape: The Scientific of the voyage which ran to fifty see a trace of gathering darkness of war preyed Voyage of HMS Challenger (ISBN volumes and is still to be found Bathybius’ on his nerves, and in 1914 he sold 9780309089043) 60 | Chemistry World | February 2008 www.chemistryworld.org