Allvar Gullstrand, Nobel Laureate in Medicine: “A scientist who does not tremble with exhaustion at the end of a semester has not fulfilled his duty”

The Swedish scientist Allvar Gullstrand remains the only ophthalmologist in history to receive the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, which he won the prize in 1911. Gullstrand’s professional career focused on studying the eye’s refractive power, measured in diopters.

More specifically, he demonstrated that the eye functions as a light-refracting system. His findings contributed to the development of the slit lamp, a reflection-free ophthalmoscope, and a mathematical model describing how light is refracted by the cornea and the lens.

Extraordinarily rigorous and exacting

His reputation at the time was also shaped by his ongoing disputes with Albert Einstein. Gullstrand was one of the main obstacles to Einstein receiving the Nobel Prize in Physics for the Theory of Relativity. On two occasions, he submitted critical reports arguing that Einstein’s work had too little practical impact on society to merit the award.

Another defining characteristic of the Scandinavian scientist was his unwavering honesty about his profession. One of his most famous statements was: “An academic professor and scientist who is not trembling with exhaustion at the end of a semester has not fulfilled his duty.” For Gullstrand, science was a total vocation that demanded complete physical and mental dedication.

He also believed that, as a researcher, a professor had an unwritten obligation to his students. Having energy left after six months of teaching, in his view, meant that one had not poured enough passion into passing knowledge on to the next generation. This conviction made him extraordinarily rigorous and exacting, so much so that he dismissed even a breakthrough as monumental as the Theory of Relativity as a mere peccadillo.

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