Brit. J. vener. Dis. (1971) 47, 459 Br J Vener Dis: first published as 10.1136/sti.47.6.459 on 1 December 1971. Downloaded from Fritz Richard Schaudinn, 1871-1906 Protozoologist of syphilis A. LENNOX THORBURN Liverpool Royal Infirmary One hundred years ago Fritz Schaudinn was born in the small obscure town of Roesiningken in Prussia. The Franco-Prussian War which had just finished had led to the foundation of the German Empire. Schaudinn had just started at the infant school when Charcot, in Paris, was impressing European medical circles with his discoveries in central nervous system diseases, especially multiple sclerosis. Following a wise and wide curriculum of studies in the Gymnasia of Insterburg and Gumbinnen, copyright. Schaudinn matriculated into Berlin University in 1890 at the normal age of 19. While at school he had been thinking about a career in philology, and only later recognized that his abiding interests would be in research into protozoan morphology. What little we know about him shows him as a rather studious young man, of robust physique. He tended to listen rather than hold forth in company and was most temperate in his life and habits. His outstanding http://sti.bmj.com/ trait was his power of observation. This inherent faculty was coupled with a gift for clear exposition in writing and these qualities served him well in his FIGURE Fritz Schaudinn, 1871-1906. From chosen vocation of protozoology. After a successful series of portraits published by Deschiens university career he graduated in 1894 with a Doctor- [Courtesy of the Wellcome Trustees]. ate in Philosophy. The research work for his thesis was based on a description of a new species and genus The array of facts presented indicated the possession on October 3, 2021 by guest. Protected of marine Foraminifera, and this very worthy and of remarkable technical ability in both eye and hands successful leap into the unknown life cycles of marine combined with an intuitive knowledge of what and life was a portent of coming events. At the same where to seek, along with a balanced intellectual time, as Schaudinn's researches were progressing, approach necessary for the interpretation of findings. Lister in England was overlapping the young Prus- Most impressive is his careful and precise presenta- sian's work with his own in the same field of proto- tion-truly an exemplary work for modern scientists. zoology; indeed, both showed independently that In 1895, on Schaudinn's return from a collecting diamorphism in Polustomella crespa is part of the trip in the Arctic, he published, under combined internal cycle. editorship with Romer, 'Fauna Arctica', a redoubt- In 1897, Schaudinn published in association with able work running into four volumes. It is especially Siedlocki a paper on the Coccidia, and further re- noteworthy to point out that this work has stood the search produced the facts on the complete life cycle test of time-not a single finding has required later of Eimeria schubergi. amplification; not a single fact has required to be This paper can be quoted as an ideal in research. added. In 1901, the medical world was greatly stirred by Received for publication February 17, 1970 the observations of Ross and Grassi on P. vivax as 460 British Journal of Venereal Diseases Br J Vener Dis: first published as 10.1136/sti.47.6.459 on 1 December 1971. Downloaded from the cause of tertian malaria. Schaudinn was naturally rise to hook-worm disease. He opened the field for extremely interested in this scientific field and as a extensive preventive and public health measures result was assigned to work in Rovigo, a small town leading to this deadly disease becoming a com- near Venice, notorious for malaria, to check these parative rarity. results. Over the next 2 years, he (Schaudinn, 1903) As a reward for this patient, exacting, and valuable further clarified the observations of Ross and Grassi work he was promoted, in 1904, at the age of 32, to by seeing for himself the entrance into the erythro- be Head of the Department of Parasitology in the cyte of the malarial sporozoite, the end-stage of the Department of Zoology of the University of Berlin- sexual cycle in the mosquito; and by observing the the youngest scientist of his time ever to hold such merozoite, the end-stage of the asexual cycle in man. a responsible post. This honour represented wide For many years there had been considerable con- recognition by leading scientists in Government troversy in medical circles in Europe and further circles of their debt of gratitude for his epoch-making afield concerning the protozoon Amoeba coli. It had studies in hook-worm and amoebic infestations as been noted by Lambl (1860) and by Lewis and Cun- well as malaria. ningham (1870) that a species of amoeba occurred The cause of the great scourge of syphilis had in the intestine of patients ill with tropical dysentery. been perplexing and baffling scientific investigators Loesch (1875) described it accurately and named it for many years. As far back as 1878, Edwin Klebs, Amoeba coli. In amoebic dysentery, clinicians saw the redoubtable bacteriologist, had attempted to a well-characterized disease and medical workers transfer syphilis to higher apes but these animal studies became convinced of the aetiological relationship of were not microscopically conclusive (Klebs, 1878). this organism to the disease, but the biologists main- They none the less led the way for Metchnikoff and tained a sceptical attitude on the pathogenicity of Roux, at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, who pub- coli. defended their attitude lished papers proving that syphilis had been defi- Amoeba They strongly, copyright. as they showed the presence of an amoeba, no nitely transferred to apes by them-although they different apparently from Amoeba coli, in the intestine did not succeed in finding the agent causing the ofUhealthy people. Before it could be stated that infection (Metchnikoff and Roux, 1903, 1904). dysentery was due to an amoeba, the biologists The foremost medical and scientific workers in justly demanded morphological differences which France and Germany were now competing in an peritted distinction between an organism associated all-out race to discover the identity of the organism; wi disease and that found in the healthy gut. the odds were slightly in favour of the German remained for Schaudinn to describe these workers using the new model of the Zeiss micro- d ences and to name the found in scope. On February 2, 1905, Professor Schulze, the species only http://sti.bmj.com/ d tery, Entamoeba histolytica. The other, found Director of the Institute of Zoology at the University in. althy people and commented on by Loesch, of Berlin, announced that Dr. Siegel, an assistant in he called Entamoeba coli. It was now apparent to his Department, claimed to have found protozoa in clinicians, pathologists, and biologists that protozoal lesions of primary syphilis and in the blood of study was of the greatest importance and a science syphilitic patients. These were similar to those he of great value to medicine. Schaudinn became aware had previously described for smallpox and scar- was now a major branch of zoology latina! This report was submitted to the Prussian t1ajjprotozoology on October 3, 2021 by guest. Protected ap491saw the contributions to the literature of the Academy of Sciences. Within days of this report, s,*ct reach such numbers that they demanded a the President of the Health Institute requested Dr. pmIjcation devoted to them alone, and this journal, Schaudinn and Dr. Neufeld (Neufeld, 1905) to tbh rchivfiir Protistenkunde, he founded in 1903. investigate at once, along with Dr. Erich Hoffman, -er completing the malarial studies in East a very capable young dermatologist and syphil- It# where he had freed the village of St. Michele'di ologist from the University Dermatological Clinic. IieR from endemic malaria by prophylactic treat- On March 3, 1905, joint study was commenced nqfi with quinine, he returned to Berlin and began and fine spirochaetes were found by Schaudinn in aufvyestigation into the modes of infection in ankylo- a fresh unstained smear of tissue juice from a second- s iasis. Clinicians had drawn his attention to ary stage papule. It is emphasized that, although pents, mainly agricultural workers and miners, Schaudin saw Spirochaeta pallidum on March 3, he afied by this hook worm which had already been did not claim on that day that it was the organism id4piified by Looss. Its mode of entrance into the causing syphilis. Indeed he was very cautious at body remained a mystery. By experiments on this stage, having seen that Siegel's protozoa (which ny4eys, Schaudinn established beyond controversy Siegel had named Cytorrhyctes luis) were not the t#t4the larvae could penetrate normal skin and give causative organisms of syphilis but were sapro- Fritz Richard Schaudinn, 1871-1906 461 Br J Vener Dis: first published as 10.1136/sti.47.6.459 on 1 December 1971. Downloaded from phytes. Schaudinn's findings were summarized A thorough and objective study of the pertinent thus in a report to the Health Institute on March 20: literature leaves no doubt that Fritz Schaudinn was the first to see T. pallidum, but to Hoffmann goes great 'Many organisms had been found and certainly protozoa were among them. A general problem must be solved, credit for his relentless work on the investigations the study of the protozoon fauna of man about which following Schaudinn's discovery, and in proving this there is at present little knowledge. This study is im- protozoon to be the cause of syphilis. portant for the critical interpretation of disease-causing By a cruel stroke of fate, Schaudinn was prevented organisms.