Talk:Frederick Banting

Farm space

A HA is a Hectare. It's not in the article, just noticed that. Thanks for pointing that out. - Mike

(The article mentions that the farm under dispute is "100 acre (40 ha)". What is a 'ha'? A unit of measure? I didn't want to take it out, but felt that it should be questioned. --Mechcozmo 21:19, 13 June 2006 (UTC))

1 acre = 0.4047 hectares Seminumerical 10:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Nicolae Paulescu

This article is about Banting, not the place to re-write scientific history.Stevenscollege 10:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

On further inspection of whats written in "Paulescu's discovery of insulin" and "Nobel Prize controversy" nothing was supported by an external reference, so its gone.Stevenscollege 10:23, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

We are not re-writing history, merely telling the truth. Banting did not discover insulin first, it was Nicolae Paulescu. In fact, there is quite a lot of evidence for this, far more than for Banting.

I understand that there are a number of people who would like to claim Nicolas Paulesco was the legitimate discoverer of insulin/pancreatin. While the academic debates will continue, I'd like to suggest that there is another avanue that hasn't been explored. Paulesco patented his process in Romania in 1921, and the American patent for Banting's version came later. Nevertheless, if Paulesco's claim is legitimate and similar enough to the Banting method, Paulesco's patent would void Eli Lilly's patent, and both Eli Lilly and the University of Toronto would owe Romania (or Paulesco's estate) a lot of money. This is a tangible question that can be resolved in court, and I would suggest that anybody who wants to champion Paulesco's claim to insulin should try doing it this way. If the courts rule in Paulesco's favor, he would not only be vindicated as the discoverer of insulin, but his descendants and country would probably profit from it.

Nicolae Paulescu

That is just Canadian bullcrap. People have the right to know the truth! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 193.138.195.202 (talk) 10:13, 4 May 2007 (UTC).

I agree, but you're definitely not helping with comments like that. (JGDo (talk) 01:13, 24 February 2009 (UTC))

I'm serious. LEARN THE TRUTH. Frederick Banting does not deserve the Nobel Prize. Canadian bullshit!!! Salvadoradi (talk) 22:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC) YOURE RIGHT !!!!!!!!!!!!

We're more than happy to support the truth. See my comment below. First, Paulesco has a legitimate (albeit debatable) claim to the title "discoverer" of insulin/pancreatin. Since the article lists Banting as a "co-discoverer," I don't see this as a problem. Second, the fact that Paulesco published a paper on an insulin/pancreatin extract that was active in dogs a few months before Banting's paper was published does not void Banting's claim to the Nobel Prize. At best it simply underscores the well known fact that others should have shared the prize with Banting and Macleod. This has been known since the day it was awarded, and both Banting and Macleod protested that others should have shared in it, and split their prize money with Best and Collip, respectively. Others, including Paulesco should have been included. However, the idea that the Nobel Committee excluded Paulesco because his work was not known, or they didn't check the relevant invormation before awarding it to Banting and Macleod (hence, some comments here about the award to Banting being an 'error') is completely false. Paulesco's work was mentioned in the Nobel Prize presentation speech in 1923. Hence, nobody can claim that the Nobel Committee was unaware of Paulesco's work when they awarded the Prize to Banting and Macleod. (JGDo (talk) 01:09, 24 February 2009 (UTC))

Where does one go to learn this "truth"? How about a couple of reliable references? By the way, the Nobel Prize is awarded by a Danish organization with input from international advisors. Silverchemist (talk) 06:52, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The problem, if there is a problem, in my opinion, is the use of the word "discovered". Long before Banting or Paulescu did any research, it was already as good as accepted that the pancreas produces a hormone which is released into the bloodstream, an insufficiency or lack of which manifests itself as diabetes. It was one of those things where you already know that something exists and what it does, but you are trying to isolate it in a usable form. The notion that Banting set out to ascertain the cause of diabetes and ended up discovering insulin is wrong. He didn't - neither did Paulescu. A number of people had tried for years to capture the pure hormone from a pancreatic extract - and it is anyone's guess as to how pure their samples were or whether their methods would have led to usable supplies of insulin in large quantities. That fact is that apart from Banting, none of the others pursued their work to a stage of commercial production of the pure hormone.

What Banting did was to devise a way of separating the two functions of the pancreas in order to facilitate the extraction of the hormone. Once that was achieved, they had something to work with, and from there it led rapidly to the purification and then manufacture on an industrial scale.

If you play around with words, you could make an argument to the effect that no-one actually discovered insulin. But the Nobel prize was awarded for "the discovery of insulin". That is a historic fact, and this is an encyclopaedia. It is not a forum for arguing that the prize was wrongly worded. 82.29.215.250 (talk) 23:09, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the article should mention that the Nobel Prize was awarded in error or at least that there is a "controversy" concering this. This would make the article consistend with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Paulescu#Nobel_Prize_controversy -Paul- (talk) 10:16, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be a good idea to start a separate article on the controversy surrounding both the discovery of insulin and the awarding of the 1923 Nobel Prize, which has been controversial from the beginning. There's enough material, and the material is getting to be too extensive to put in either the insulin page, or the page about Nobel Prize controversies. I would mention two things here, though.

1. The awarding of the Prize to Banting and Macleod has been controversial from the start. Most of the controversy surrounded who was not included in the award. The Nobel committee's own website has already discussed this, and can be used as a link: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/articles/lindsten/index.html

The bottom line regarding this is that nobody except Banting and Macleod were nominated, and the Nobel Prize rules state that only people who are nominated can win. From the beginning, however, there was talk that others should have been included, but weren't. Most notabley, the day after the announcement, Banting complained that Best should have been included, and shared his half of the prize money with Best, and Macleod claimed Collip should have been included, and likewise split his prize money with Collip. There were others who should probably have been included as well, including Paulesco.

2. The awarding of the Prize to Banting is not an 'error' in the sense of the Nobel Committee not knowing of Paulesco's work, as some have suggested. It is clear that the Nobel Committee did the necessary background research on the insulin work that preceded Banting's, because they mentioned the history of insulin research in the 1923 Nobel Prize presentation speech before giving Banting and Macleod the award. Here is the link to the speech: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1923/press.html

The relevant passage is here, where Paulesco is mentioned. "Amongst these I should like especially to mention Zuelzer, who in 1908 produced an extract which was undoubtedly effective, but which also showed injurious by-effects-consequently it could not be used to any great extent therapeutically-and also Forschback, Scott, Murlin, Kleiner, Paulesco, and many others." (JGDo (talk) 01:28, 24 February 2009 (UTC))

Banting's assistants.

The article claims that Banting was assigned only one assistant, a graduate student, Charles Best. It was my understanding that A) Banting was originally assigned two assistants, Charles Best and E. Clark Noble, and B) Both Best and Noble were not graduate students, but 4th year undergraduates.

Does anybody have an objection to me mentioning E. Clark Noble in this article?

While Banting was originally given two lab assistants, for reasons that are still controversial, only Best ended up helping Banting for the summer, and Noble did not. The controversy surrounds the story that a coin toss determined who would work with Banting, and that Best won the toss. Banting and Noble both claimed there was a coin toss, and Best claimed there wasn't, for reasons that have been questioned (in various biographies). At any rate, while Noble didn't get to help Banting, he was subsequently hired by Macleod to work on fish-derived insulin, and was involved in many of the early papers regarding the characterization of insulin. Thus, I think Clark Noble, who was a good friend of Charles Best, deserves to get a mention as one of the two lab assistants that were originally assigned to help Banting. (JGDo (talk) 01:41, 24 February 2009 (UTC))