Extraterrestrial vestibular research, a new partial field of medical research into the human vestibular apparatus.
The first otologic professorial chair in the world was established by Politzer in Vienna as long ago as 1861. In 1914 an assistant of the 1st Vienna Ear Clinic with Politzer as its head, Barany, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for his fundamental investigations into the organ of equilibration and for his discovery of the caloric sensitivity of the semicircular canals. Since that time Barany is regarded as the founder of the physiology of the vestibular apparatus. During the period 1959 to 1963 a new conception of fundamental research into the vestibule was demanded and elaborated in Vienna with the postulate that, in all theoretical deliberations and practical experience, one should take into consideration that our experiments into the vestibule do not take place on a static platform but rather on a diversely moving one, namely the surface of the earth. This led to new findings in the field of research into the otolith apparatus. In 1962 it was discovered that the gravitation of the sun at the distance of earth-sun represents a supraliminal stimulus, namely both in the aphelion as well as in the perihelion position of the earth. In 1965 it was suggested in Vienna that a new branch of research into the vestibule should be established on an international level, the so-called extraterrestrial vestibular research. The importance of this new branch of research is discussed for all problems of orientation of human beings in space.
Pichler
H J
HJ
D000337:Aerospace Medicine / Q000639:trends; D001317:Austria; D006801:Humans; D010037:Otolithic Membrane / Q000502:physiology*; D012106:Research / Q000639:trends; D013026:Space Flight; D014722:Vestibule, Labyrinth / Q000502:physiology*; D014893:Weightlessness