Carlos de la Torre y Huerta. Paradigma del quehacer científico cubano / Carlos de la Torre y Huerta. Paradigma of Cuban scientific activity

RESUMEN La dimensión científica educativa constituye uno de los aportes más sólidos de la obra de Carlos de la Torre y Huerta. Su extensa obra investigativa se nutre de las asignaturas que impartió en la Universidad de la Habana entre las que se desatacan Paleontología, Arqueología, Antropología, Zoología, Geología, Biología y Entomología. Estos estudios favorecieron el descubrimiento de la gran riqueza existente en el país, destacándose una trayectoria ejemplar cuyos cimientos se insertan en la malacología. El descubrimiento de las Polymitas lo llevan a describir una diversidad de subespecies que lo insertan en el escenario internacional aclamado como un referente de obligatoria consulta para los especialistas. La divulgación sistemática de su obra lo conducen a la formación de una escuela cubana de naturalistas en la que los discípulos marcaron impronta en el quehacer científico nacional al apropiarse de las herramientas que le permiten hacer ciencia utilizando medios de enseñanza, imágenes proyectadas, láminas, dibujos y ejemplares autóctonos del país (AU).

ABSTRACT The educational scientific dimension is one of the strongest contributions of the work of Carlos de la Torre and Huerta. His extensive research work draws on the subjects he taught at the University of Havana, including Paleontology, Archeology, Anthropology, Zoology, Geology, Biology and Entomology. These studies favored the discovery of the great wealth existing in the country, highlighting an exemplary trajectory whose foundations are inserted in malacology. The discovery of the Polymites leads him to describe a diversity of subspecies that insert him in the acclaimed international scenario as a mandatory reference for specialists. The systematic dissemination of his work lead him to the formation of a Cuban school of naturalists in which the disciples marked imprint on the national scientific work by appropriating the tools that allow him to do science using teaching means, projected images, prints, drawings and native copies of the country (AU).

The gender gap in science: How long until women are equally represented?

Women comprise a minority of the Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine (STEMM) workforce. Quantifying the gender gap may identify fields that will not reach parity without intervention, reveal underappreciated biases, and inform benchmarks for gender balance among conference speakers, editors, and hiring committees. Using the PubMed and arXiv databases, we estimated the gender of 36 million authors from >100 countries publishing in >6000 journals, covering most STEMM disciplines over the last 15 years, and made a web app allowing easy access to the data (https://lukeholman.github.io/genderGap/). Despite recent progress, the gender gap appears likely to persist for generations, particularly in surgery, computer science, physics, and maths. The gap is especially large in authorship positions associated with seniority, and prestigious journals have fewer women authors. Additionally, we estimate that men are invited by journals to submit papers at approximately double the rate of women. Wealthy countries, notably Japan, Germany, and Switzerland, had fewer women authors than poorer ones. We conclude that the STEMM gender gap will not close without further reforms in education, mentoring, and academic publishing.

Curiosidades históricas: apuntes sobre algunos momentos de la historia de las ciencias de la salud / Historical curiosities: notes on some moments in the history of health sciences

Se refieren casi coloquialmente, mediante párrafos sueltos, a veces alargados algunos hechos históricos vinculados con la odontología o la medicina. El propósito es despertar en los colegas interés por el tema y, a la vez, brindar un poco de distensión en esta época tan complicada

The Trembley Effect or the birth of marine zoology.

At a time when Europe was engaged in the War of Austrian succession, an unknown scholar, Abraham Trembley, managed to dramatically influence the course of the Natural Sciences. He focused his interest not only on the properties of a new organism, the polyp later named Hydra, and its freshwater environment, but also on the communication of his discoveries to the most estimable scholarly circles of his time. Under the patronage of influential scholars, Réaumur in Paris and Folkes in London, he forged a new perspective on a common object – water. Everyone had seen a glass of water and through it he could project the concept of a wet laboratory and hence reshape the experimental practices of naturalists. His research propelled a surge of interest for investigation of the aquatic environment, a new line of investigative force that can be called the Trembley Effect. This effect pushed scholars to explore the shallow areas of water, to test the properties of tiny aquatic bodies, to examine the frontiers between organisms. Thanks to Trembley, it was the first time that, in a fully artificial setting, man could give life to an animal species, a practice that created for all of those who tried it, an enigmatic feeling of power that stirred passions for decades. Indeed this experimental approach that emerged in parallel to Linnaean classifications, inaugurated a new phase of Natural Sciences.

[Natural scientists and medical bibliography in the Dominican Monastery of Dubrovnik]. / Prirodozanstvenici I medicinska bibliografija u Dominikanskom Samostanu u Dubrovniku.

This article speaks about Dubrovnik's Dominicans who were engaged in natural studies or wrote medical dissertations. It brings a list of manuscripts and printed works kept in the Dominican monastery library. These include six incunabulae and more than 200 works on anthropology, anatomy, hygiene, pharmacy, and general, theoretical, and practical medicine, internal and cerebral medicine, orthopaedics, surgery, ophthalmology, psychology, and gerontology. Tractates on all kinds of diseases, especially contagious, and their treatment, are also included. A portion of these works comes from donations by various doctors who worked in Dubrovnik, and others were acquired for the needs of the monastery pharmacy. These works were written in Latin, Italian, French, German, and Croatian. Such a wide range of works on almost all aspects of medicine is more akin to a professional library of a medical college than to a monastery library, howevergrand or important it really is.

[Hermann Lebert (1813-1878): natural scientist, spa doctor, histopathologist and clinician in Switzerland, France and Germany]. / Hermann Lebert (1813-1878): Naturforscher, Badearzt, Histopathologe, Kliniker in der Schweiz, in Frankreich und in Deutschland.

H. Lebert was in many ways an extraordinary personality. He began is career as a scientist performing experimental research in botany and zoology. After a short period as a spa doctor--work he approached on a scientific basis--he performed one of the first microscopic tissue analyses, as well as writing two significant works with a wealth of pictures on pathophysiology and histopathology, thereby paving the way for cellular pathology. In addition to general problems relating to inflammation, he concentrated on tumors and tuberculosis. He was one of the first to recommend pre-operative histology, making him a pioneer of biopsy diagnostics.As a clinician he worked in nearly all areas of internal medicine, including neurology, and published a large number of monographs, of which the first German monograph on acute articular rheumatism was one. Rheumatology played a considerable role in both his histopathological and clinical activities.Of particular interest is the fact that Lebert frequently travelled between Switzerland, France and Germany and was applauded in all three as a great scientist, as awards from both Napoleon III and the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV can testify.

'Cenas de tempos profundos': ossos, viagens, memórias nas culturas da natureza no Brasil / 'Scenes from deep times': bones, travels, and memories in the cultures of nature in Brazil

Este artigo considera os diferentes papéis assumidos pelos naturalistas de campo e de gabinete na construção das culturas da natureza e na disputa para a construção de carreiras científicas no século XIX. A partir do conceito de 'experiência liminar', comenta aspectos ainda pouco considerados da obra paleontológica de Peter Wilhelm Lund (1801-1880) no Brasil e sua repercussão internacional.

This article examines the different roles played by field and non-field naturalists in constructing cultures of nature and in the dispute to construct scientific careers in the nineteenth century. Based on the concept of "threshold experience," it looks at little-explored aspects of Peter Wilhelm Lund's paleontological work (1801-1980) in Brazil and its international impact.

Caminos, ciencia y Estado en el Perú, 1850-1930 / Pathways, science, and the State in Peru, 1850-1930

El objetivo de este estudio es brindar una visión panorámica de la relación entre el desarrollo de los estudios naturalistas con el control del territorio en el Perú desde mediados del siglo XIX hasta las primeras décadas del siglo XX. Durante esta etapa se produjo un notable desarrollo científico - tanto de investigadores como de instituciones académicas - que recibieron el respaldo del Estado peruano que empezaba a contar con mas recursos después del periodo de relativa inestabilidad que se sucedió a la Independencia en 1821. Aunque este desarrollo fue fragmentado y discontinuo permitió la elaboración de los primeros mapas, estudios geográficos y naturalistas, establecimiento de vías de comunicación y estuvo justificado por su potencial contribución a una economía de exportación y al prestigio cultural de elites civiles.

This study offers a panoramic view of the relation between the development of naturalist studies and the control of territory in Peru from the mid-nineteenth century through the first decades of the twentieth. Notable scientific development took place during this period, in terms of research and of academic institutions. Both research and academe enjoyed the support of the State, which had greater resources within its reach following the period of relative instability subsequent to Independence in 1821. Although this process of development was fragmented and discontinuous, it resulted in the first mapmaking work and geographic and naturalist studies, as well as the creation of communication pathways. Further, it was justified by its potential contribution to an export economy and to the cultural prestige of civilian elites.

Conciliar o útil ao agradável e fazer ciência: Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro - 1808 a 1860 / Joining pleasure and work in the making science: the Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro - 1808 to 1860

Embora esteja às vésperas de completar duzentos anos, a trajetória do Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro ainda carece de estudo sistematizado. O artigo busca compreender as questões que ocasionaram o desinteresse por esse estabelecimento científico nas pesquisas da história das ciências e das instituições, acarretando a permanência do que consta em memória elaborada pelo seu diretor João Barbosa Rodrigues, por ocasião do centenário da instituição. Analisa as principais questões relacionadas à sua história desde a criação em 1808, até sua incorporação pelo Imperial Instituto Fluminense de Agricultura, em 1861, com o objetivo de colaborar para as discussões acerca da história das instituições e das ciências naturais, no período em foco.

Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro played an important role in the first half of the nineteenth century. Although the park will soon celebrate its two-hundredth anniversary, no systematized study of it has ever been undertaken. With the intent of contributing to discussions on the history of institutions and the natural sciences during the period in question, the article seeks to uncover what has lain behind this disinterest in the Garden on the part of researchers from the history of the sciences and history of institutions. The article also analyzes major issues in the history of the Garden from its creation in 1808 until becoming part of the Imperial Instituto Fluminense de Agricultura in 1861.

Museos escolares, colecciones y la enseñanza elemental de las ciencias naturales en la Argentina de fines del siglo XIX / School museums, collections, and elementary teaching of the natural sciences in late XIX century Argentina

En este trabajo se analiza la organización de la enseñanza de las ciencias naturales en el contexto escolar argentino a partir de las prácticas de enseñanza y los soportes materiales que se promovieron a fines del siglo XIX. En esa época, funcionarios escolares y profesores fomentaron la modernización y nacionalización de la enseñanza a partir del uso de colecciones con ejemplares del territorio nacional y la formación de museos en las escuelas. En particular, se examinan los debates oficiales sobre las colecciones mineralógicas ofrecidas en venta por el naturalista Enrique de Carlés y los "museos escolares" de los profesores Pedro Scalabrini y Guillermo Navarro que dan cuenta de las tensiones entre procurar materiales didácticos modernos, asociados a los modelos extranjeros, y la importancia de contar con elementos representativos de la naturaleza e industria nacional.

In this study we analyze the organization of natural science teaching within the Argentinian school context starting with teaching practices and material support in the late XIX century. By that time, school staff and teachers fostered modernization and nationalization of teaching by using collections with national issues and the foundation of museums within the schools. In particular, we examine the official debates over the mineralogical collections offered for sale by the naturalist Enrique de Carlés, and the "school museums" by professors Pedro Scalabrini and Guillermo Navarro. These account for the tension between searching for modern didactic materials associated with foreign models, and the importance of counting on elements that represented the country nature and industry.