author
W. D. Bayliss
A pioneering British physiologist, this early 20th-century scientist helped reveal how chemical signals control digestion and wrote a classic textbook that shaped modern physiology.
1 Audiobook
Prisoners their own warders : a record of the convict prison at Singapore in the Straits Settlements, established 1825, discontinued 1873, together with a cursory history of the convict establishments at Bencoolen, Penang and Malacca from the year 1797
by John Frederick Adolphus McNair, W. D. Bayliss
About the author
Born in 1860, Sir William Maddock Bayliss was an English physiologist best known for work that transformed the study of how the body functions. Working closely with Ernest Starling, he helped discover secretin, widely recognized as the first hormone to be identified, and their research opened a new way of understanding chemical communication inside the body.
Bayliss also made important contributions to the study of digestion, circulation, and general physiology. He taught at University College London, became a Fellow of the Royal Society, and later received a knighthood. His book Principles of General Physiology became an influential scientific text.
Beyond the laboratory, Bayliss is also remembered for his role in the highly public Brown Dog controversy, a public dispute over animal experimentation in Edwardian Britain. Even so, his lasting reputation rests on the depth and range of his scientific work, which helped lay foundations for modern physiology and biochemistry.