Robert J. White
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Robert Joseph White (January 21, 1926 – September 16, 2010) was an American
neurosurgeon Neurosurgery or neurological surgery, known in common parlance as brain surgery, is the medical specialty that focuses on the surgical treatment or rehabilitation of disorders which affect any portion of the nervous system including the brain, ...
and
bioethicist Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethics, ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biolo ...
best known for his work on
hypothermia Hypothermia is defined as a body core temperature below in humans. Symptoms depend on the temperature. In mild hypothermia, there is shivering and mental confusion. In moderate hypothermia, shivering stops and confusion increases. In severe ...
and his experiments with head transplants on mammals, including living monkeys.


Early life

White was born January 21, 1926, raised in
Duluth, Minnesota Duluth ( ) is a Port, port city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of St. Louis County, Minnesota, St. Louis County. Located on Lake Superior in Minnesota's Arrowhead Region, the city is a hub for cargo shipping. The population ...
, by his mother and an aunt. His father was killed in combat while serving in the Pacific theater during
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
. White stated in a 2009 Motherboard interview that his interest in the human brain started in
high school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., ...
when his
biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...
teacher admired his dissection of a frog cranium and told White that he should become a brain surgeon.


Education and career

White began his undergraduate studies at the University of St. Thomas before entering the
University of Minnesota Medical School The University of Minnesota Medical School is a medical school at the University of Minnesota. It is a combination of three campuses located in Minneapolis, Duluth, and St. Cloud, Minnesota. The medical school has more than 17,000 alumni as of 2 ...
in 1949; he later transferred to
Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area, Longwood Medical Area in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is the third oldest medical school in the Un ...
in 1951, where he earned his medical degree ''
cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sout ...
'' in 1953. White had ten children with his wife, Patricia Murray, a nurse he met at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital while completing his surgical internship and residency. A devout Roman Catholic, Dr. White was a member of the
Pontifical Academy of Sciences The Pontifical Academy of Sciences (, ) is a Academy of sciences, scientific academy of the Vatican City, established in 1936 by Pope Pius XI. Its aim is to promote the progress of the mathematical, physical, and natural sciences and the study ...
. He attended mass regularly and prayed before performing surgeries. Throughout his career, White performed over 10,000 surgical operations and authored more than 900 publications on clinical neurosurgery, medical ethics and health care. He received honorary doctorates from
John Carroll University John Carroll University (JCU) is a Private university, private Jesuit university in University Heights, Ohio, United States. Located in a suburb of Cleveland, it is primarily an undergraduate, liberal arts college, liberal arts institution compo ...
(Doctor of Science, 1979),
Cleveland State University Cleveland State University (CSU) is a public research university in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It was established in 1964 and opened for classes in 1965 after acquiring the entirety of Fenn College, a private school that had been in oper ...
(Doctor of Science, 1980), Walsh University (Doctor of Humane Letters, 1996) and the University of St. Thomas (Doctor of Sciences, 1998). White received invitations worldwide to speak, lecture and share his medical expertise. He was a consultant to the Burdenko Institute of Neurosurgery in Moscow and was the only foreign member of both Russian and Ukrainian Academies of Medical Science. He lectured extensively in the U.S., Russia, China and Europe. White also became an adviser to Pope John Paul II on medical ethics. He established the Vatican's Commission on Biomedical Ethics in 1981 after his appointment to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. Under White's leadership, the Commission influenced the church's stance on brain death and in vitro fertilization. He nicknamed himself Humble Bob. White founded Metro's neurosurgery department. Many people know him for being the leading target for protesters. A PETA activist went as far as to call him "Dr. Butcher" and described his experiments as "epitomizing the crude, cruel
vivisection Vivisection () is surgery conducted for experimental purposes on a living organism, typically animals with a central nervous system, to view living internal structure. The word is, more broadly, used as a pejorative catch-all term for Animal test ...
industry." For 40 years, White was a neurological surgery professor at
Case Western Reserve University Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) is a Private university, private research university in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It was established in 1967 by a merger between Western Reserve University and the Case Institute of Technology. Case ...
medical school, a well-liked teacher and an acclaimed surgeon. He was one of the best known neurosurgeons in the United States, notably for his head transplant experiments on rhesus monkeys.


Research

In 1970, after a long series of preliminary experiments, White performed a transplant of one monkey head onto the body of another monkey. Because the surgery included severing the
spine Spine or spinal may refer to: Science Biology * Spinal column, also known as the backbone * Dendritic spine, a small membranous protrusion from a neuron's dendrite * Thorns, spines, and prickles, needle-like structures in plants * Spine (zoology), ...
at the neck, the subjects were paralyzed from the neck down. After the surgery, because the cranial nerves within the brain were still intact and nourished by the circulatory system from the new body, the monkey could still hear, smell, taste, eat and follow objects with its eyes. Ultimately, immune rejection caused the monkey to die after nine days. Jerry Silver, an expert in regrowing severed nerves, called White's experiments on monkeys, "fairly barbaric." During the 1990s, White planned to perform the same operation on humans and practiced on corpses at a mortuary. He hoped he could do head transplant surgery on the physicist
Stephen Hawking Stephen William Hawking (8January 194214March 2018) was an English theoretical physics, theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author who was director of research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at the University of Cambridge. Between ...
and the actor
Christopher Reeve Christopher D'Olier Reeve (September 25, 1952 – October 10, 2004) was an American actor, activist, director, and author. He amassed Christopher Reeve on stage and screen, several stage and screen credits in his 34-year career, including playin ...
. The continuation of White's work in head transplantation research and application has been discussed recently in the neurosurgical literature by Italian neurosurgeon Sergio Canavero; the feasibility of spinal cord reconstruction and cephalo-spinal linkage in humans received support in 2014 from a German study.


Death

White died at his home in Geneva, Ohio, on September 16, 2010, at age 84 after suffering from
diabetes Diabetes mellitus, commonly known as diabetes, is a group of common endocrine diseases characterized by sustained high blood sugar levels. Diabetes is due to either the pancreas not producing enough of the hormone insulin, or the cells of th ...
and
prostate cancer Prostate cancer is the neoplasm, uncontrolled growth of cells in the prostate, a gland in the male reproductive system below the bladder. Abnormal growth of the prostate tissue is usually detected through Screening (medicine), screening tests, ...
.


References


Sources


The Frankenstein Factor
* *Journalist and author
Oriana Fallaci Oriana Fallaci (; 29 June 1929 – 15 September 2006) was an Italian journalist and author. A member of the Italian resistance movement during World War II, she had a long and successful journalistic career. Fallaci became famous worldwide for h ...
wrote "The Dead Body and the Living Brain" (''Look'', 26, 1967, pgs 99–105) based on White's experimentation on primates; in turn, this was included in the 2010 book edited by philosopher Tom Regan and theologian Andrew Linzey, ''Other Nations: Animals in Modern Literature''. {{DEFAULTSORT:White, Robert J. 1926 births 2010 deaths American neurosurgeons Harvard Medical School alumni Members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences People from Duluth, Minnesota University of Minnesota Medical School alumni Animal testing in the United States Catholics from Minnesota Physicians of Brigham and Women's Hospital