The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research : history, organization and equipment.

  • Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research
Date:
1912
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research : history, organization and equipment. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Hospital is accordingly recruited by clinicians who can bring to the problems seledled a special training in one or more of the auxiliary sciences. To this end, in addition to the clinical laboratories for rou- tine examinations and diagnosis, the Hospital is equipped with patho- logical, physiological, and chemical laboratories of its own. The other fundtion of the Hospital is to provide facilities for the therapeutic application of results that have been obtained, whether from purely experimental investigations in the Laboratories or from clinical in- vestigations in the Hospital.In the organization of the scientificstaff of the Institute, it has been recognized that the ultimate purposes of medical research and discovery may be greatly served by the study of biological and chemical problems that, as such, may appear remote from medical applications. On the other hand, it has not thus far been the purpose of the Institute to choose rare and strange diseases, or atypical cases of common diseases, in preference to those more preva- lent or familiar, on which to spend its resources. On the contrary, the diseases now under investigation, whether in the Laboratories or in the Hospital, include many of those which are regarded as the chief scourges of mankind. THE LABORATORIES The Laboratories of the Institute are subdivided as follows; Patho- logy and Badleriology, Chemistry, Physiology and Pharmacology, Experimental Biology, Experimental Surgery. The Diredlor of the Laboratories is the chief adviser of the Board of Scientific Direftors in regard to the scientific work done in that department, and is the ordinary means of communication between the scientific'staff and the Board. He also has immediate control of the work in his own sub- je6t. The work in each of the other subjeds is conducted by a Mem- ber, with a staff of assistants. The Laboratory Buildingis afireproof strudure of steel frame, with outer walls of yellowish gray brick and limestone. Its simple facade shows five full stories, and a basement which is half above ground. The basement is subdivided into a number of rooms of various sizes, which contain some of the machinery of the building and also the heavier laboratory apparatus, such as centrifuges, a vacuum pump, shaking apparatus, etc. One room is conneded by a spiral stairway with the Library above, and is used for the older files of periodicals or other little used books. Two of the rooms serve as storage rooms for laboratory supplies, and two as the Janitor’s quarters. The re- maining space is available for various uses, such as temporary storage, machinist’s and carpenter’s work, etc. [ 1° ]