Haldan Keffer Hartline

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Keffer, Haldan Hartline was an American physiologist who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1967 for his research on the neurophysiology of vision. He was awarded the prize alongside George Wald and Ragnar Granit. Hartline studied the optic nerves of frogs and horseshoe crabs for decades. He was the first scientist to isolate and record a single optic nerve fibre’s activity. Later, he demonstrated that distinct optic nerve fibres respond to light in different ways. Hartline’s interest in physiology and medicine began at a young age. His parents were State Normal School lecturers (now Bloomsburg State College). Hartline was inspired to pursue Natural Sciences by his father, a biology professor. Hartline has devoted his career to studying cellular-level electrical activity in the eye since the beginning. In addition to scientific studies, he held a number of academic roles throughout his life. He was a biophysics professor at Johns Hopkins University and afterwards a neurophysiology professor at the Rockefeller Institute.

Childhood and Adolescence

Haldan Keffer Hartline was born in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania on December 22, 1903 to David S Hartline and Harriet Frankline Keffer Hartline. Both of his parents worked as teachers. Hartline was affected tremendously in his early years by his father, who was a biology professor with a wide range of interests that included astronomy and geology. He gained a passion in Natural Sciences through senior Hartline, which he carried with him for the remainder of his life.

Hartline obtained his early education at State Normal School, where both of his parents were teachers. He attended Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, after finishing his early schooling. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the same institution in 1923.

Hartline pursued study beyond graduation, thanks to the encouragement of his college professor Beverly W. Kunkel. He published his first scholarly work on land isopod visual reactions. In the autumn of 1923, he enrolled at John Hopkins University after spending the summer at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole.

Hartline was encouraged to continue his vision studies at John Hopkins University in the Department of Physiology, where he worked with E. K. Marshall and C. D. Snyder. He began his research on the electrophysiology of the retina. He studied the retinal action potential in frogs, decerebrate cats, and rabbits using Snyder’s Einthoven string galvanometer. He recorded electroretinograms from animals and recognized retinal action potentials from human participants over a period of time.

Hartline earned his doctorate in medicine from John Hopkins University in 1927. He was awarded a National Research Council Fellowship almost immediately, allowing him to pursue his interests in mathematics and physics. He studied in the University’s Physics Department for the next two years. Hartline was awarded the University of Pennsylvania’s Eldridge Reeves Johnson Traveling Fellowship in 1929. He was able to study at the Universities of Leipzig and Munich thanks to the fellowship.

Career of Haldan Keffer Hartline

Hartline returned to the United States after studying the Universities of Leipzig and Munich to work at the Eldridge Reeves Johnson Foundation for Medical Physics at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was directed by Detlev W. Bronk.

Hartline began his research on the activity of a single optic nerve fibre in the eye of the horseshoe crab Limulus at the Johnson Foundation, monitoring the responses of receptor units under various stimulation and adaption settings.
He worked on single fibre study of the optic responses of the vertebrate retina, primarily in the frog’s eye, in the mid-1930s. He was eventually the first to isolate and record the activity of a single optic nerve fibre. Later, he demonstrated that distinct optic nerve fibres respond to light in different ways. Hartline also worked on problems of night vision in human subjects in the early 1940s.

Hartline worked as an Associate Professor of Physiology at Cornell Medical College in New York City from 1940 to 1941. He returned to Johnson Foundation, however, and remained there until 1949.
In 1949, he obtained a job at John Hopkins University as Professor of Biophysics and Chairman of the Thomas C Jenkins Department of Biophysics. Hartline recorded from the receptor units in the Limulus eye while working as a Professor of Biophysics. He resumed his study of the inhibitory interaction in the Limulus retina, which he had started a few years before.

In 1953, Hartline took Professorship at the Rockfeller Institute (now Rockfeller University) (now Rockfeller University). At Rockfeller Institute, he was joined by Floyd Ratliff the next year. Together with Ratliff, he researched receptor characteristics and inhibitory interaction in the eye of Limulus. The duo even researched on numerous factors connected to visual physiology.

Major Works of Haldan Keffer Hartline

Hartline devoted the major portion of his career examining the electrical reactions of the retinas of some arthropods, vertebrates and molluscs. Furthermore, he focused his work on the eye of the horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) (Limulus polyphemus). Hartline acquired the first record of the electrical impulses sent by a single optic nerve fibre when the receptors linked to it are triggered by light. Later, he demonstrated that distinct optic nerve fibres respond to light in different ways.

Awards & Achievements

Hartline received a number of awards and honors during his lifetime. He won the William H. Howell Award in 1927. The Society of Experimental Psychologists awarded him the Howard Crosby Warren Medal in 1948, the Albert A. Michelson Award from Case Institute of Technology in 1964, and the Lighthouse Award in 1969. Hartline was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1967. He won the award for his research into the neurophysiological mechanisms of vision. George Wald and Ragnar Granit were his co-winners.

Several universities and institutions have bestowed honorary doctorates on him. He graduated from Lafayette College with a DSc. degree in 1959. In 1969, he received his LLD from John Hopkins University. He obtained an honorary D.Sc. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1971, as well as an honorary M.D. from Albert-Ludwigs University in Freiburg im Breisgau.

Professor Hartline was a member of a number of prestigious academies and scientific societies throughout his career, including the National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of London, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the American Physiological Society, the Optical Society of America, the Biophysical Society, and others.

Personal History and Legacy

In 1936, Hartline married Elizabeth Kraus in a religious ceremony. C.A Kraus, an outstanding chemist, was her father. Elizabeth was a Comparative Psychology instructor at Bryn Mawr College. Daniel Keffer, Peter Haldan, and Frederick Flanders were the couple’s three sons. On March 17, 1983, in Fallston, Maryland, United States, Hartline passed away.

Estimated Net Worth

The estimated net worth of  Haldan Keffer Hartline is unknown.