Tissues and organs

Early biologists viewed their work as a study of the organism. The organism, then considered the
fundamental unit of life, is still the prime concern of some modern biologists, and understanding how
organisms maintain their internal environment remains an important part of biological research. To
better understand the physiology of organisms, researchers study the tissues and organs of which
organisms are composed. Key to that work is the ability to maintain and grow cells in vitro (“in glass”),
otherwise known as tissue culture.

Some of the first attempts at tissue culture were made in the late 19th century. In 1885, German
zoologist Wilhelm Roux maintained tissue from a chick embryo in a salt solution. The first major
breakthrough in tissue culture, however, came in 1907 with the growth of frog nerve cell processes by
American zoologist Ross G. Harrison. Several years later, French researchers Alexis Carrel and Montrose
Burrows had refined Harrison’s methods and introduced the term tissue culture. Using stringent
laboratory techniques, workers have been able to keep cells and tissues alive under culture conditions
for long periods of time. Techniques for keeping organs alive in preparation for transplants stem from
such experiments.

Advances in tissue culture have enabled countless discoveries in biology. For example, many
experiments have been directed toward achieving a deeper understanding of biological differentiation,
particularly of the factors that control differentiation. Crucial to those studies was the development in
the late 20th century of tissue culture methods that allowed for the growth of mammalian embryonic
stem cells—and ultimately human embryonic stem cells—on culture plates.

Kara Rogers

Edna R. Green

The history of biology

There are moments in the history of all sciences when remarkable progress is made in relatively short
periods of time. Such leaps in knowledge result in great part from two factors: one is the presence of a
creative mind—a mind sufficiently perceptive and original to discard hitherto accepted ideas and
formulate new hypotheses; the second is the technological ability to test the hypotheses by appropriate
experiments. The most original and inquiring mind is severely limited without the proper tools to
conduct an investigation; conversely, the most-sophisticated technological equipment cannot of itself
yield insights into any scientific process.