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At times, progress comes at a considerable cost. Gaining new understanding about ourselves or the world around us isn’t always without its sacrifices. Fortunately, there have always been individuals who were willing to place themselves at risk for the betterment of humanity as a whole.
10. John Scott Haldane
John Scott Haldane, a Scottish scientist, investigated the physiology of respiration. He explored how various hazardous gases affect both the body and mind, often conducting experiments on himself—and sometimes even on his son. One notable instance occurred in 1893, when he confined himself in an airtight chamber, affectionately named “the coffin,” and stayed there for eight hours. Breathing the same air repeatedly, he documented its impact on him. He discovered that reducing oxygen in the blood enhances its ability to carry carbon dioxide, a phenomenon now known as the Haldane effect.
He then turned his attention to the hazardous gases found in mines. Using small animals for testing, he identified carbon monoxide as the deadly gas. To confirm his findings, he exposed himself to carbon monoxide in a sealed chamber to observe if the effects matched his expectations. Ultimately, he proposed using small animals, particularly canaries, as early gas detectors due to their quicker reaction to harmful gases.
When World War I erupted, the German army began deploying poison gas as a weapon. Haldane was called to the front lines to identify the gas—chlorine—and devise a solution. Once again, he volunteered his own body for experimentation, which ultimately led to the creation of the first gas mask.
9. David Pritchard
In the late 1980s, while working in Papua New Guinea, Dr. David Pritchard made some intriguing observations about the local population. The Necator americanus parasite, commonly known as the hookworm, posed a significant problem for the community. However, it seemed to have some unexpected benefits. Individuals infected with the parasite were less prone to autoimmune disorders, especially asthma and hay fever.
Upon returning to Nottingham University, the doctor was eager to test his theory and explore the potential link between the two factors. However, he faced a significant obstacle. Hookworms were highly dangerous, responsible for 65,000 deaths annually in the tropics and causing numerous cases of anemia. The British National Health Service’s ethics committee wouldn’t permit him to conduct experiments with human participants unless he could prove it was safe.
Faced with limited options, Pritchard did the only thing he could think of: he became his own test subject. He deliberately infected himself with 50 hookworms to develop a safe experimental protocol under controlled conditions. Eventually, he determined that future participants should be exposed to just 10 parasites—enough to collect valuable data without putting them at significant risk. It wasn’t until 2006 that the National Health Service granted him approval to conduct human trials.
8. Moran Campbell
Dr. Moran Campbell, a pioneering researcher in respiratory health, was also the inventor of the Ventimask, a device still in use today. While his work covered various aspects of breathing, his experiments on dyspnea (difficulty breathing) stand out as particularly noteworthy.
Dyspnea refers to the sensation of shortness of breath that occurs when our ability to breathe is compromised. While it is a normal response during intense physical exertion, dyspnea also manifests in situations where it shouldn't. Campbell was determined to uncover the link between this condition and the functioning of the respiratory muscles.
To investigate, he devised an experiment to push his respiratory muscles to their limits. First, he paralyzed his entire body, except for his forearm, using curare, a potent toxin typically used on poison darts and arrows. This ensured he couldn’t control his body movements, yet remained fully conscious throughout the process. Campbell was then connected to a respirator, as he was unable to breathe on his own. Shortly thereafter, the respirator was switched off, and Campbell was left to slowly suffocate in an attempt to observe his body’s response.
The experiment, however, proved to be less than useful. Campbell himself admitted that being paralyzed with curare (or “curarized,” as he called it) was a far cry from the paralysis caused by prolonged or ischemic contraction.
7. Horace Wells
As Dr. Campbell demonstrated, not all self-experiments lead to clear, positive outcomes. In some cases, the results can be even more disastrous. This was true for Horace Wells, a dentist who played a significant role in introducing anesthesia into dental practices. Specifically, he pioneered the use of nitrous oxide (laughing gas) as an anesthetic during tooth extractions. To test the effectiveness of the gas, he used it on himself and had one of his own teeth removed.
Initially, the process seemed to work well, and Wells went on to perform several more extractions without issue. Confident in his findings, he decided to showcase the technique on a larger stage. He scheduled a demonstration at Massachusetts General Hospital, but things went wrong when the gas wasn’t administered correctly, and his patient began screaming in agony.
Now tarnished and disgraced, Wells moved to Europe to continue his research. When he returned to America, he found that nitrous oxide had fallen out of favor, replaced by ether and chloroform. Wells, ever determined, turned his attention to chloroform and began experimenting with it in the only way he knew—on himself. Unfortunately, the dangers of prolonged exposure to chloroform were not understood at the time. After a week of inhaling the gas, Wells went into a psychotic state. At one point, he threw a container of sulfuric acid at two prostitutes, which led to his imprisonment.
When his sanity returned, Wells was overwhelmed by guilt, which eventually led him to take his own life.
6. Maurizio Montalbini
Humans are guided by a circadian rhythm, which synchronizes our active hours with the day. Our internal biological clock operates on a 24-hour cycle, influenced by external cues. But what would happen if these external signals were removed? This was the question Maurizio Montalbini, a sociologist, sought to explore. To answer it, he decided to isolate himself completely—by living in a cave for several years.
Montalbini first attempted this experiment in December 1986, spending seven months in the Frasassi Caves, setting a world record for complete isolation. He repeated the experiment twice more—once in 1992 and again in 2006—each time enduring one full year and 260 days of isolation in a cave.
As Montalbini discovered, the absence of external time cues caused significant changes in both the body and mind. For him, time seemed to pass much more quickly. He consistently felt that he had spent less time in the caves than he actually had. During his first experiment, he lost about 14 kilograms (30 lb). His body adapted to staying awake for up to 50 hours at a time, followed by only five hours of sleep.
5. Lazzaro Spallanzani
Not every experiment has to involve danger. Some are just plain odd—and even a bit unpleasant. Take Lazzaro Spallanzani, for instance. This 18th-century Italian biologist explored a wide range of topics, from echolocation to biogenesis. However, it’s his investigations into bodily functions that earn him a spot in this list.
Spallanzani made significant contributions to our understanding of digestion. Prior to his research, the prevailing belief was that digestion was simply a mechanical process known as trituration. Spallanzani changed that by revealing that digestion involved a chemical reaction. He demonstrated how food was broken down by gastric juices in the stomach. For his experiments, he used various animals. To collect gastric juice samples, he would either induce vomiting in the animals or insert a sponge attached to a cord down their throats.
On other occasions, he investigated the effects of gastric juices on food at different stages. This was done by either inducing regurgitation, allowing the food to pass naturally, or by dissecting the animal to collect its stomach contents. He would then analyze any changes in the food samples, such as weight loss.
He didn’t just conduct these experiments on animals—he also experimented on himself. Spallanzani would swallow food samples wrapped in linen bags or wooden tubes and regurgitate them after a delay. At times, he would even swallow the same sample more than once when necessary.
4. Jack Barnes
Around 50 years ago, Australia faced a serious condition known as Irukandji syndrome. This caused symptoms like severe headaches, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. If left untreated, it could even lead to death. To figure out what caused it, Dr. Jack Barnes had a hunch—it might be the box jellyfish.
Today, we understand that many species of box jellyfish are among the most dangerous creatures on Earth, and we take every precaution to avoid them. However, Dr. Barnes caught one of the jellyfish responsible—a tiny creature just 2.5 centimeters (1 inch) in diameter—and allowed it to sting him to test if he would develop Irukandji syndrome. Not stopping there, he also stung his son and a local lifeguard to make sure of the results.
All three individuals became ill and had to be rushed to the hospital, where they eventually made a full recovery. It was confirmed that the tiny jellyfish was indeed the cause of the illness, and in honor of Dr. Barnes, it was later named Carukia barnesi. It was also discovered later on that other species of jellyfish could also lead to Irukandji syndrome.
3. Henry Head
Dr. Henry Head was an English neurologist who made significant contributions to our understanding of the somatosensory system, particularly focusing on nociception, which is the perception of pain. Initially, he used recovering patients with nerve damage as subjects for his studies. However, he quickly realized that their lack of medical knowledge prevented him from obtaining the accurate and objective results he needed. So, he decided to turn to a better subject—himself.
But there was one issue. He had no nerve damage to study. The solution was simple—after a quick surgery, two severed nerves in Head’s left forearm, and the issue was resolved.
Dr. Head spent the following four years meticulously documenting his recovery. Every weekend, he would visit his colleague's room at Cambridge, where he underwent thorough examinations of both his affected and unaffected arms, carefully noting the differences between them.
Head paid close attention to every sensory change he experienced after his radial nerves were severed. His observations led him to become one of the first to introduce the concept of sensory dissociation, hypothesizing the existence of two separate sensory systems, which he named the epicritic and protopathic systems.
2. Jesse Lazear
Yellow fever is still one of the most perilous diseases that humanity faces, though it used to be even more devastating. In 1900, a group of four researchers, known as the Reed Commission, were assigned the task of studying the disease. At the time, the cause of yellow fever was uncertain. The prevailing theory suggested that it was spread through direct contact, but not everyone was convinced. The four scientists relocated to Cuba, a hotbed for the virus, and set to work.
One of the researchers was the young Dr. Jesse Lazear, who focused on tropical diseases like yellow fever and malaria. A British scientist, Sir Ronald Ross, had recently proven that malaria was transmitted by mosquitoes, so Lazear joined the Commission with the strong belief that mosquitoes were also the culprits behind yellow fever. He wasn’t the first to suspect this; Cuban scientist Carlos Juan Finlay had come to the same conclusion. However, unlike Finlay's unsuccessful attempts, Lazear’s experiment would prove the theory right.
"I rather think I am on the track of the real germ," Lazear wrote in a letter to his wife. Just 17 days later, he passed away. This tragic outcome occurred because, without informing his colleagues, Lazear had allowed himself to be infected with yellow fever in order to establish the link between the disease and mosquitoes.
His sacrifice was far from in vain, as his pioneering work played a vital role in discovering a treatment for yellow fever.
1. Donald Unger
As a young boy, Donald Unger, like many others, was constantly scolded by his mother for cracking his knuckles. She insisted that it would lead to arthritis, but he eventually found himself in a position where he could challenge this belief. Every day, he cracked the knuckles on only his left hand while leaving his right hand untouched. He wanted to observe if any noticeable differences would appear by the end of the experiment.
At first, this might not seem particularly unusual—just cracking your knuckles daily. However, what truly sets this experiment apart is its remarkable duration: 60 years.
For an astounding six decades, Dr. Unger adhered to his daily routine to see if cracking his knuckles would indeed cause arthritis. When he finally concluded the test, he took detailed X-rays of both hands and discovered no significant difference between them. In recognition of his dedication, Dr. Unger was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2009.
