Johannes Peter Müller | |
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Johannes Peter Müller
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|
Born |
Koblenz, Germany |
14 July 1801
Died | 28 April 1858 Berlin, Germany |
(aged 56)
Nationality | Germany |
Fields | Physiology |
Alma mater | Bonn University |
Thesis | Commentarii de phoronomia animalium (1822) |
Doctoral advisor | August F. J. K. Mayer |
Other academic advisors | Karl Rudolphi |
Doctoral students |
Hermann von Helmholtz Rudolf Virchow |
Influenced |
Charles Scott Sherrington Jakob von Uexküll |
Johannes Peter Müller (14 July 1801 – 28 April 1858) was a German physiologist, comparative anatomist, ichthyologist, and herpetologist, known not only for his discoveries but also for his ability to synthesize knowledge.
Müller was born in Koblenz. He was the son of a poor shoemaker, and was about to be apprenticed to a saddler when his talents attracted the attention of his teacher, and he prepared himself for the Roman Catholic priesthood. During his college course at Koblenz, he devoted himself to the classics and made his own translations of Aristotle. At first, his intention was to become a priest.
When he was 18 though, his love for natural science became dominant, and he turned to medicine, entering the University of Bonn in 1819. There he received his M.D.. He then studied at Berlin. There, under the influence of Hegel and Rudolphi, he was induced to reject all systems of physiology which were not founded upon a strict observation of nature.
He became Privatdozent of physiology and comparative anatomy at Bonn in 1824, extraordinary professor of physiology in 1826, and ordinary professor in 1830. In 1833 he went to the Humboldt University of Berlin, where he filled the chair of anatomy and physiology until his death.
Müller made contributions in numerous domains of physiology, in particular increasing understanding of the voice, speech and hearing, as well as the chemical and physical properties of lymph, chyle and blood. His first important works, Zur vergleichenden Physiologie des Gesichtsinns (“On the comparative physiology of sight,” Leipzig, 1826) and Über die phantastischen Gesichtserscheinungen (“On visual hallucination,” Coblenz, 1826), are of a subjective philosophical tendency. The first work concerns the most important facts as to human and animal sight, the second sounds depths of difficult psychological problems. He soon became the leader in the science of the morphological treatment of zoology as well as of experimental physiology. To his research (1830) is due the settlement of the theory of reflex action.