Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 2256

GRAHAM LUSK (1866-1932) The elements of the science of nutrition. W. B. Saunders 1906 326 [2] 16 pp., plate (front.), tables, graphs (1 col.). 22.4 cm.

Lusk was a pioneer in the study of nutrition in the United States. It is quite possible that he elected not to follow his father into clinical medicine because he was partially deaf. Lusk received a degree in chemistry from the Columbia University School of Mines in 1887 and went to Europe where he studied experimental physiology under Karl Ludwig (1816-1895) and physiological chemistry under Carl Voit (1831-1908). After receiving a doctorate at Munich in 1891, he taught physiology at Yale Medical School, was appointed to the chair of physiology at the Bellevue Hospital Medical College in 1898, and in 1909 moved to Cornell University Medical College from which he retired in 1932. Lusk was particularly interested in metabolism and nutrition and utilized the calorimeter to study the metabolic process in both health and disease. In his earliest research on glycosuria, he found that there was a constant ratio between the amount of dextrose and nitrogen excreted in the urine. Lusk investigated the amino acids as possible sources of carbohydrate and found that carbohydrates were not normally formed when fats were metabolized. He also researched the respiratory quotient and the relationship of surface area to the rate of basal metabolism. This work played a large part in establishing scientific standards for energy requirements of humans. It was the present work that revealed the usefulness of the calorimeter in measuring energy relationships in metabolic research and gave his ideas and techniques wide exposure to the scientific community. The book became a widely used text and appeared in four editions, the last in 1928.

Cited references: Garrison-Morton 1045