MARINE SCIENCE 135 
At first glance there does not seem to be a close association between 
medical research and oceanography. Indeed, we are accustomed to 
thmk of medical research as being largely restricted to the activities 
of dedicated men working in hospitals, health institutes, medical 
schools, and pharmaceutical laboratories. But this is not the whole 
story. Medicine has always benefited, in its continued progress to- 
ward understanding health and disease, from the knowledge gained 
in diverse fields from physics to psychology. To the increasing body 
of information, marine biology has also made its contributions. 
As we testified at the hearings on S. 2692 last year, major medical 
discoveries have been made through study of marine organisms. To 
mention just a few: 
The phenomenon of anaphylaxis, the trauma or shock reaction that 
may follow immunization and consequent sensitization to specific sub- 
stances, was discovered about the beginning of this century by study- 
ing the effect of the sting of jellyfish and Portuguese man-of-war. 
We might add that neither the toxin itself nor an antidote to it is 
vet known. 
Phagocytosis, the process by which white blood cells protect the 
body from invading bacteria, was discovered by experimenting—for 
other purposes—with young sea urchins. 
Discovery of important vitamins concentrated in the liver of codfish 
and sharks—and coming ultimately from microscopic marine organ- 
isms that form a part of the food chain culminating in the fishes— 
is something that we all can recall, with varying degrees of distaste, 
from our childhood. 
The transmission of nerve impulses along a nerve fiber and across 
synapses has been clarified through investigations on the unusual, 
giant nerve cells in the squid. The contribution of this animal to 
neurology is no less than that of the fruitfly Drosophila to the field 
of genetics. 
This list could be extended to great length. But all of the medically 
important results so far acquired are small indeed compared to the 
potentially significant information that further study of marine 
organisms may yet reveal. 
What are some of the areas in marine biology that are important 
from a medical point of view? They fall into several broad cate- 
gories. There are, for example: 
1. Studies related to the production or extraction of medically im- 
portant substances from sea water or marine organisms; 
2. Investigations of unusual toxins and their pharmacological 
properties ; 2 
3. Research on the nature of parasitism ; 
4. Analysis of physiological mechanisms, including both those that 
are widespread and those that are unique. 
In some of these categories the relationship to medicine is readily 
recognized; in others it is obscure and indirect. To enlarge upon the 
former and to clarify the latter, some specific examples may be cited. 
1. In the first category, 2 number of potentially important anti- 
biotics are known to be produced by marine micro-organisms, and re- 
cently an effective antiviral agent has been found in the muscles of 
abalone. Vitamins, health foods, blood extenders, are all known to 
be produced by a variety of marine plants and animals. Carrageen, 
