Who is Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov? Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov - briefly about his biography, contribution to medicine. Brain research. Central braking

1829-1905) - grew up. physiologist, author of the program for building psychology as an independent science, formulated by him in the 1860-70s, which represented a consistently materialistic and deterministic solution to the problems of the nature of the psyche, the subject and methodology of psychology. This program was based on S.'s famous discovery (in experiments with frogs - Ed.) of the phenomenon of "central inhibition", which for the first time in science made it possible to materialistically explain the phenomena of voluntary human behavior. According to S., the subject of psychology should be various types of mental activity of the subject (human and animals), which S. called for studying in their history (development) and in the system of connections with each other. The main method of psychology should be the method of objective observation of the development of mental processes, which occurs from external forms in the form of expanded reflexes - for example, actions with objects of the external world - to seemingly exclusively internal, but in fact “collapsed” forms of actions -. eg thoughts about objects. Without using the term “interiorization,” S, in fact, sets out one of the first concepts of interiorization, the ideas of which will be developed in the 20th century. At the same time, the idea of ​​internalization is also used by S. to explain the formation of moral norms in human behavior, which initially represent external prohibitions and rules, and subsequently become “internal” prohibitions and rules of behavior of the individual himself.

S.’s ideas (about the possibility of an objective experimental study of thinking, about unconscious mental life, the idea of ​​activity and goal determination in relation to the work of scientific research, about feedback as a factor in the regulation of behavior, etc.), ahead of their time, had a significant impact on the development of domestic science. psychology and physiology (V.M. Bekhterev, I.P. Pavlov, N.A. Bernstein, activity approach in psychology, etc.) and anticipated many studies in world science of the 20th century. See also Kavelin K. D. (E. E. Sokolova.)

Sechenov Ivan Mikhailovich

(08/1/1829, village Teply Stan - 11/2/1905, Moscow) - Russian physiologist and psychologist.

Biography. In 1856 he graduated from the medical faculty of Moscow University. Since 1860 - professor of physiology at the Medical-Surgical Academy, then at Novorossiysk, St. Petersburg, and Moscow universities. Honorary member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (1904).

Research. He discovered the effect of “central inhibition”, which he considered as the basis of voluntary human behavior. The subject of psychology was understood as various types of mental activity of the subject, presented in the history of their development and in the system of connections with each other. The main method of psychology is objective observation of the development of mental processes that occur from external forms (reflexes) to internal ones, which are actually “collapsed” forms of actions (thoughts). Moral norms in human behavior also represent external prohibitions and rules that have acquired internal form, with the help of which others guide the actions of an individual.

Essays. Selected philosophical and psychological works. M., 1947

The discovery of the mechanisms that control human mental life, this extremely important branch of the science of brain life, begins with the works of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov. Sechenov, and later Pavlov, Vvedensky, Ukhtomsky, Bekhterev and other Russian scientists created the physiology of higher nervous activity.

Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov was born on August 13, 1829 in the village of Teply Stan, Simbirsk province (now the village of Sechenovo, Nizhny Novgorod region) into a noble family.

Sechenov's father, Mikhail Alekseevich, was a military man in his youth, served in the Preobrazhensky Guards Regiment, but then retired with the rank of second major and settled in the village. Mother, Anisya Egorovna, was a peasant woman who, having married her master, freed herself from serfdom.

The village belonged to two landowners. The western half of the village was the estate of Pyotr Mikhailovich Filatov, and the eastern side was the property of Mikhail Alekseevich Sechenov. Mikhail Alekseevich had a two-story house where his family lived, which he had difficulty supporting. He had five sons and three daughters, and the income from the estate was small. But Mikhail Alekseevich well understood the importance of education and considered it his duty to give it to his children.

When it was time to send Ivan to the Kazan gymnasium, his father died. By this time, the older brothers had become adults; only Ivan, Varvara and Seraphima were minors. After the death of Mikhail Alekseevich, the family did not have enough money to educate their children in the city.

Vanya’s older brother, having returned from Moscow to the village one day, told his mother about his new acquaintance with a military engineer. From a conversation with him, he learned that the service of a military engineer is profitable, and studying at the Main Engineering School in St. Petersburg is inexpensive: for four years you need to pay only 285 rubles. For this modest contribution, the pupil was taught, fed and clothed there. The education received at the engineering school was considered quite solid - young people studied mathematical and engineering sciences there. The story about the engineering school made an impression on my mother, and Anisya Grigorievna Sechenova decided to send Ivan to this school.

On August 15, 1843, Ivan Sechenov was admitted to the Main Military Engineering School, where other outstanding Russian people studied - the writer Grigorovich, Dostoevsky, the hero of Sevastopol, General Totleben... Having successfully studied for five years in the lower classes of the school, Ivan Sechenov did not pass exams in fortification and construction art and therefore, instead of being transferred to the officer class, on June 21, 1848, he was sent with the rank of ensign to serve in Kyiv, in the 2nd reserve engineer battalion.

At this time, he met the family of a progressive-minded doctor and his daughter Olga Alexandrovna. They had a huge influence on him and Sechenov decided to resign.

On January 23, 1850, he retired from military service with the rank of second lieutenant. In October of the same year, Ivan Sechenov enrolled as a volunteer student at the Faculty of Medicine of Moscow University. The rules there were strict. The most serious offense for a student was going out without a sword or wearing a cap instead of a cocked hat. It was required to salute your superiors, as well as military generals. Disorder in the uniform was severely punished. Sergei Petrovich Botkin was the first to suffer - the collar of his uniform was not fastened with hooks, which is why he was put in a cold punishment cell for a day.

The first lecture Sechenov listened to at the university was on anatomy. Professor Sevruk read it in Latin, which Sechenov almost did not know, but, thanks to his abilities and diligence, he quickly learned. Having devoted all his free time to preparing for the university entrance exams, Ivan Sechenov successfully became a student.

Ivan Mikhailovich showed the greatest interest in the course of physiology, which was combined with comparative anatomy. These two disciplines were taught by Professor Ivan Timofeevich Glebov. Students respected Glebov and willingly attended his lectures. But as in other Russian universities in this era, there were very few experiments and demonstrations in the physiology lectures.

After completing courses in comparative anatomy and physiology, as well as such general natural sciences as chemistry, physics and botany, Sechenov had to begin the study of pathology. General pathology and therapy was taught by professor of pathological anatomy Alexey Ivanovich Polunin. Another professor, Toporov, taught one of the most important subjects at the medical faculty - private pathology and therapy. This was a course in internal medicine - the basis of the fundamentals of medicine.

At lectures, Toporov often resorted to formulations from the textbook of the French doctor Grisolle. Studying this textbook, Sechenov became more and more perplexed: “What kind of science is medicine - nothing more than listing the causes of the disease, symptoms of the disease, its outcomes and methods of treatment; but there is no information about how the disease develops from causes, what its essence is and why this or that medicine helps in the disease.” At that time, physiology was just in its infancy; scientific microbiology and the study of infectious diseases, as well as histology, did not exist.

Student Sechenov turned for clarification to Polunin, the then medical luminary, the founder of the first department of pathological anatomy in Russia, which he headed. “Don’t you want, dear sir, to jump above your head? - Professor Polunin was surprised at such assertiveness. - Grisoll is not satisfied, study the works of Kapstatt. Generally speaking, young man, keep in mind that knowledge is not only taken from books, it is mainly obtained from practice. If you treat, you will make mistakes. When you go through the difficult science with your patients, then you will become a doctor.”

It is possible that Sechenov would have left medicine as easily as he parted with military service, if he had not met F.I. Inozemtsev on his way. Fascinated by the strange theory that irritations of the sympathetic nervous system, determining the nature of most diseases, cause catarrh of the mucous membranes, Inozemtsev, according to Sechenov, stubbornly fed all the patients of his clinic ammonia as an anti-catarrhal panacea. For this he was teased with "salmonica" ("ammonia" in Latin "Sal ammoniacum"). Professor Inozemtsev's fascination with the role of the sympathetic nervous system in the origin of many diseases, his amazing foresight of the importance of the nervous system in the study of diseases aroused Sechenov's great interest. This is how Sechenov’s student scientific work “Do Nerves Affect Nutrition” was born.

He was irresistibly attracted to physiology, which, with the help of chemistry, physics and new experimental methods, had to pose questions and seek answers.

In 1855, when Ivan Mikhailovich was a 4th year student, his mother died unexpectedly. Earlier, he wrote to her with love: “My dear, kind, intelligent mother was beautiful in her youth, although, according to legend, in her blood there was... an admixture of Kalmyk blood. Of all the brothers, I went into my mother’s black family and from her I received that appearance, thanks to which Mechnikov, returning from a trip to the Nogai steppe, told me that in these Palestines, no matter the Tatar, he was the spitting image of Ivan Mikhailovich. Before marriage, her father sent her (mother) to some Suzdal women’s monastery to learn literacy and women’s handicrafts. Therefore, as a child, I remember her no different in appearance from the neighboring elderly landowners, who treated her with great love because of her sweet, meek disposition...” After the death of his mother, Sechenov renounced his right to the estate and was paid compensation in the amount of 6,000 rubles. He used the money to continue his studies abroad.

On June 21, 1856, Sechenov passed the exams at the university and received a certificate: “For his excellent success, by determination of the University Council, he was approved as a doctor with honors, with the right to receive a diploma for the degree of Doctor of Medicine after defending his dissertation.”

Physiology was at a higher level abroad; one had to go there to improve in this science. Sechenov went to Berlin. He decided to start his studies with chemistry. The laboratory of medicinal chemistry was headed by the young scientist Goppe-Seyler. Sechenov in his laboratory studied the chemical composition of fluids entering the body of animals. Here Sechenov hatched a plan to study acute alcohol poisoning. The idea to scientifically illuminate the effect of acute alcohol poisoning on the human body was suggested to Ivan Mikhailovich by the special role of vodka in modern people’s lives. This work served as material for his doctoral dissertation.

Sechenov's accumulation of facts about acute alcohol poisoning, based on experiments, took place in the laboratory of Ernst Heinrich Weber, a prominent German anatomist and physiologist, who was one of the first to describe in detail the structure of the sympathetic nervous system. Together with his brother Eduard, Ernst Weber discovered an important fact: the inhibitory effect of the vagus nerves on the activity of the heart. First, Sechenov conducted a series of experiments to identify the effect of alcohol on breathing, and then began to find out how alcohol intake affects nitrogen metabolism. Ivan Mikhailovich did these studies in two versions: under normal conditions and when drinking alcohol. There alternated days when Sechenov, overcoming his aversion to alcohol, drank precisely measured portions of alcohol, and days when he did not drink alcohol. Sechenov studied the effect of alcohol on muscles and nerves on frogs.

In the winter semester of 1856, Sechenov attended a course of lectures on electrophysiology from Dubois-Reymond. Electrophysiology was a new field of study. This science used changes in electrical potentials that occur in the organs and tissues of the body to study physiological processes. The audience of this most interesting scientist was small, only seven people, and among them were Sechenov and Botkin. During his year in Berlin, Ivan Mikhailovich listened to lectures by Magnus on physics, Rose on analytical chemistry, Johannes Müller on comparative anatomy, and Dubois-Reymond on physiology.

In the spring of 1858, Sechenov moved to Vienna to the most prominent physiologist of that time - Professor Karl Ludwig, famous for his work on blood circulation. Ludwig, according to Sechenov, was an international teacher of physiology for almost all young scientists from all parts of the world. This was facilitated by the wealth of his knowledge and pedagogical skill.

During his student years, Sechenov became close to the literary circle of Apollo Grigoriev, which, in addition to poetry readings, was famous for its cheerful revelries, in which the future “father of Russian physiology” took a direct part. Ultimately, for Sechenov, participation in these parties was not in vain - he became interested in the problem of the effects of alcohol on the human body.

Sechenov studied the effect of alcohol on blood circulation and oxygen absorption in the blood in the laboratory of Karl Ludwig. The entire summer season of 1858 was spent on these studies. All summer, Ivan Mikhailovich did nothing but pump gases out of the blood using the method that was usually used at that time. But this method was unsatisfactory; it was necessary to look for other ways to solve this difficult problem. After much thought and searching, Sechenov found a way out. He redesigned L. Meyer's device - the absorption meter, turning it into a pump with continuously renewable emptiness and the ability to warm the blood. Regarding his invention, Ivan Mikhailovich wrote: “In this way, the doctrine of blood gases was put on a solid road, and these same experiments, as well as a long fuss with L. Meyer’s absorptiometer, were the reason that I devoted a very significant part of my life to questions about blood gases and on the absorption of gases by liquids." Ivan Sechenov was twenty-nine years old when he created this method for studying blood gases.

Sechenov’s next point of study was the University of Heidelberg, where professors Bunsen and Helmholtz, famous in Europe, taught. With the chemist Robert Bunsen, Sechenov analyzed mixtures of atmospheric air with carbon dioxide and attended a course of lectures on inorganic chemistry. Sechenov heard that Bunsen had developed methods of gas and spectral analysis; using spectral analysis, he discovered the elements cesium and rubidium; was the first to obtain the metals lithium, calcium, barium and strontium.

Subsequently, Ivan Mikhailovich wrote about how Bunsen was remembered by him: “Bunsen read excellently and during lectures had the habit of sniffing the odorous substances described, no matter how harmful and nasty the odors were. They said that once he snorted something until he fainted. He had long since paid for his weakness for explosives with his eye, but at his lectures he carried out explosions at every opportunity. So now, armed with a long stick with a feather stuck at the end at a right angle and wearing glasses, he exploded iodine-nitrogen and chlorine-nitrogen in open lead crucibles, and then solemnly showed drops of the last compound on the bottom pierced by the explosion. Suffering from forgetfulness, he often comes to lectures with an inverted ear - a legacy of school age that has survived into old age. When, during the lecture, with a wave of the professor's hand, the auricle returned to normal, this meant that the reminder had done its job - the dangerous point had not been forgotten. When, as often happened, the ear remained twisted at the end of the lecture, the young audience dispersed with cheerful conversations about whether the dangerous point had been forgotten or the ear had been forgotten. Bunsen was everyone’s favorite, and he was called only Papa Bunsen, although he was not yet an old man.”

In Helmholtz's laboratory, Ivan Mikhailovich conducted four scientific studies in physiology: the effect of irritation of the vagus nerve on the heart, a study of the speed of contraction of various muscles in a frog, a study of physiological optics, and a study of gases contained in milk.

In Berlin, Vienna, Leipzig and Heidelberg, Sechenov completed a large program that he compiled for himself for a deep and comprehensive mastery of modern experimental physiology, and also completed work on his doctoral dissertation. It was written and sent to St. Petersburg, to the Medical-Surgical Academy, where it was to be defended. Modestly called by the author “Materials for the future physiology of alcohol poisoning,” it was distinguished by the wealth of experimental data, breadth of coverage of the problem and deep scientific insight into the essence of the topic at hand. This doctoral dissertation was published in the Military Medical Journal in February 1860.

On the evening of February 1, 1860, Sechenov arrived in a postal stagecoach from Riga to his homeland, St. Petersburg. On March 5, he defended his dissertation and received the title of Doctor of Medicine. At the same time, the conference of the Medical-Surgical Academy admitted him to exams for the title of associate professor.

After passing the exams, Sechenov was offered to lecture on physiology. On March 19, Ivan Mikhailovich gave the first lecture. It should be noted that he began his work when physiology in Russia was not yet an experimental science. Ivan Mikhailovich quickly reached the forefront of science and became one of the founders of experimental physiology, its most complex section - the central nervous system.

On April 16, Sechenov was enrolled as an associate professor at the department of physiology, and on March 11, 1861, Sechenov was unanimously elected by the conference of the Medical-Surgical Academy as an extraordinary professor, that is, supernumerary, not occupying the department.

In September 1861, Sechenov’s public lectures “On plant acts in animal life” were published in the Medical Bulletin. They were the first to formulate the concept of the connection between an organism and its environment. In June of the following year, Ivan Mikhailovich went on a year's vacation abroad and worked for the second time in Paris in the laboratory of Claude Bernard. There he discovered the neural mechanisms of “central inhibition.” With the discovery of “Sechenov’s inhibition,” in the words of the successor of Sechenov’s works, Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, “it is considered a completely common, established truth that all our nervous activity consists of two processes: irritable and inhibitory, and our whole life is a constant meeting, the relationship of these two processes." Sechenov's work was approved by Claude Bernard. At the end of 1862, it appeared in print under the title “Physiological study of the inhibitory mechanisms of the brain on the reflex activity of the spinal cord.” Ivan Mikhailovich dedicated this work to Karl Ludwig: “To his highly respected teacher and friend.”

In the fall of 1861, Sechenov met Maria Alexandrovna Bokova and her friend N.P. Suslova. Both young women wanted to get a higher education and become doctors. But they could not go to university: at that time in Russia the path to higher education for women was closed. Then Bokova and Suslova began to attend lectures at the Medical-Surgical Academy as volunteers and, despite the difficulties, studied medicine. Sechenov warmly sympathized with the desire of Russian women for higher education and therefore eagerly helped them in their studies. Moreover, at the end of the academic year, he gave both of his students topics for scientific research. Both of Sechenov’s students, under his supervision, completed doctoral dissertations and defended them in Zurich. Subsequently, Maria Alexandrovna Bokova became Sechenov’s wife and his constant friend.

In May 1863, Sechenov returned from abroad to St. Petersburg and began work. In addition to lectures, Ivan Mikhailovich prepared essays about so-called animal electricity for publication. Under the influence of galvanic current, various changes occur in the nerves and muscles, which shed light on the essence of neuromuscular phenomena. Sechenov's experiments in the use of electricity to clarify a number of physiological issues attracted attention. For this work, on June 12, the Academy of Sciences awarded him the Demidov Prize.

Ivan Mikhailovich devoted the whole summer to creating, as he wrote, “a thing that played some role” in his life. “A brilliant stroke of Sechenov’s thought,” is how Pavlov called the pinnacle of Sechenov’s scientific creativity, his work “Reflexes of the Brain.” In this work, Sechenov destroyed the eternal illusion of humanity about the God-given soul. He said that scientists have different views on the role of the brain. Some of them, taking the brain as an organ of the human soul, “separate the latter from the former,” others say “that the soul in its essence is a product of the activity of the brain. For physiologists, it is enough that the brain is an organ of the soul, that is, a mechanism that, when set in motion by whatever reasons, gives the final result that series of external phenomena that characterize mental activity. Everyone knows how vast the world of these phenomena is. It contains all the infinite variety of movements and sounds that a person is generally capable of. And this whole mass of facts needs to be embraced... All the endless variety of external manifestations of brain activity finally comes down to just one phenomenon - muscle movement..."

Ivan Mikhailovich tore off the veil of mystery that has always surrounded the mental life of man. Animation, passion, ridicule, sadness, joy - all these phenomena of the life of the human brain are expressed as a result of a greater or lesser shortening or relaxation of some group of muscles - a purely mechanical act. If the body receives a weak stimulation, but the reaction to it is amazingly strong, or, conversely, the strongest stimulation is received, and the reaction to it is weak, sluggish, the brain is to blame. Reflexes with a strengthened end against excitation include human passions. Thought - from a physiological point of view - is a reflex with a depressed end: excitement, psychological analysis and synthesis in the brain and the absence of the third part of the reflex - movement. This absence of the third member of the reflex - movement - is caused by the activity of the brain, its nerve centers. They delay, slow down the completion of the reflex, and prevent it from reaching the response movement. A person experiences terrible pain - he should have screamed, but a strong person endures the pain in silence. His pain sensation, conscious in the brain, is two members of the reflex triad, but there is no last member - the person silently endures suffering. A person suffers, he is aware of suffering, thinks, thinks about it - “a mental reflex without end (without movement) is a thought,” Sechenov teaches. Let them now say that without external sensory stimulation, mental activity and its expression - muscle movement - are possible, even for a moment.

Censor Veselovsky wrote in his memo that Sechenov’s work “undermines religious beliefs and moral and political principles.” Privy Councilor Przhetslavsky, the second censor from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, accused Sechenov of bringing a person “into the state of a pure machine,” subverting all the moral foundations of society and destroying the religious dogma of the future life. On October 3, the Minister of Internal Affairs banned the publication in the Sovremennik magazine of Ivan Mikhailovich’s work “An Attempt to Introduce Physiological Foundations into Mental Processes.” Under the modified title “Reflexes of the Brain,” this essay was published in the journal “Medical Bulletin.”

On April 4, 1864, Sechenov was confirmed with the rank of ordinary professor of physiology at the Medical-Surgical Academy. Three years later, Ivan Mikhailovich attempted to publish his main work as a separate book. In 1866 and 1867, the publication of “Reflexes of the Brain” as a separate book was banned.

Minister of Internal Affairs Valuev wrote to the head of the Ministry of Justice, Prince Urusov, about “Reflexes”: “The meaning and significance of the theory he proposes is clear. To explain in a public book, at least from a physiological point of view, the internal movements of a person by the actions of external influences on the nerves and the reflection of these influences on the brain - does not this mean replacing the doctrine of the immortality of the spirit with a new doctrine that recognizes in man only one matter... and “In your Excellency’s opinion, Sechenov’s work is undeniably harmful.”

The book's circulation was arrested, and Sechenov's materialistic views led to persecution by the authorities. He was prosecuted. Ivan Sechenov greeted the news of an attempt to initiate legal proceedings against him extremely calmly. To questions from friends about a lawyer who would defend him in court, Sechenov replied: “Why do I need a lawyer? I will take a frog with me to court and perform all my experiments in front of the judges: then let the prosecutor refute me.” The fear of disgracing himself in the eyes of Russian society, and indeed the whole of Europe, forced the government to abandon the trial of the author of “Reflexes of the Brain” and, reluctantly, allow the publication of the book, and on August 31, 1867, an order was made to lift the arrest from “Reflexes of the Brain” ", and the book was published.

In 1867-1868, Sechenov worked in Austria, in the city of Graz, in the laboratory of his friend Rollet. He discovered the phenomena of summation and trace in nerve centers, published the work “On the electrical and chemical stimulation of the spinal nerves of the frog.”

There was not a single Russian name in the Russian Academy of Sciences in the category of natural sciences. In December 1869, Sechenov was elected corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences. On December 20, 1869, he resigned from the Medical-Surgical Academy in connection with the nomination of his close friend I.I. Mechnikov as a professor at the academy.

For some time Sechenov worked in the laboratory headed by Dmitry Mendeleev. Then for a number of years he was a professor at Novorossiysk University. Without ceasing to study the physiology of the nervous system, Sechenov became interested in a new, extremely important and little-studied problem - the state of carbon dioxide in the blood. “This seemingly simple question,” wrote Sechenov, “required for its solution not only experiments with all the main components of blood separately and in various combinations with each other, but, to an even greater extent, experiments with a long series of salt solutions.”

In an effort to uncover the secrets of the most important physiological process of absorption by blood from tissues and release of carbon dioxide, Sechenov studied its physicochemical essence, and then, expanding the scope of his research, made major discoveries in the field of solution theory.

In September 1869 he became a corresponding member of the Imperial St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In the spring of 1876, Sechenov again came to the city on the Neva and took up the position of professor in the department of physiology of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of St. Petersburg University. Despite these difficulties, however, Sechenov carried out various physiological studies here and obtained valuable results. He largely completed his work related to the physicochemical laws of the distribution of gases in the blood and artificial saline solutions, and in 1889 he managed to formulate the “Sechenov equation” - an empirical formula that relates the solubility of a gas in an electrolyte solution to its concentration. This equation is still used by science today. The study of human gas exchange began at this time.

Sechenov, as well as the wider scientific community, was of great interest in the sensation of those years - the flight of three French aeronauts in the Zenit balloon, who rose to a height of 8 kilometers. However, this flight ended tragically: two balloonists died from suffocation. Ivan Sechenov analyzed the reasons for their death and in December 1879, in a report at the VI Congress of Naturalists and Doctors, he expressed an idea about the peculiarities of physiological processes occurring in the human body at reduced air pressure.

An exceptionally gifted and bright person, progressive in his scientific views and social convictions, a brilliant lecturer, Sechenov enjoyed enormous authority among students, but his superiors did not tolerate him, and he was forced to leave St. Petersburg. “I decided to replace the professorship with a more modest privat-docent in Moscow,” Sechenov wrote with irony.

In the fall of 1889, Sechenov returned to Russia. However, as before, obstacles were created for the scientist and his scientific work was hindered in every possible way. But he could not refuse research work. His longtime friend Karl Ludwig, who at that time was a professor at the University of Leipzig, who perfectly understood Sechenov’s mood, told his venerable student that as long as he was alive, there would always be a room in his laboratory for the Russian physiologist. And Sechenov, deprived for almost three years of the opportunity to engage in his life’s work, physiological research, almost agreed to work in Ludwig’s laboratory, and in Moscow - only to lecture. However, Professor of Physiology Sheremetevsky died, a vacancy appeared, and in 1891 Sechenov became a professor at the Department of Physiology at Moscow University.

With the same energy, the scientist continued his experiments. Sechenov completely completed research on the theory of solutions, which was highly appreciated and confirmed in the coming years by chemists in Russia and abroad, began research on gas exchange, constructing a number of original instruments and developing his own methods for studying the exchange of gases between blood and tissues and between the body and external environment. Admitting that “studying breathing on the go was always my dream, which at the same time seemed impossible,” Sechenov studied human gas exchange in dynamics. He continues to pay great attention to neuromuscular physiology. His generalizing major work “Physiology of Nerve Centers” was published.

In December 1901, Ivan Sechenov left teaching at the Department of Physiology at Moscow University and resigned, refusing to give even private courses.

Sechenov devoted a lot of time and effort to the development of women's education in Russia. Under his leadership, the first psychophysiological studies were carried out by Russian women. Sechenov participated in the organization and work of the Higher Women's Courses in the capital, and taught at women's courses at the Society of Educators and Teachers in Moscow.

In life, Sechenov was a modest person and was content with very little. Even close friends did not know that Ivan Sechenov had high awards: the Order of St. Stanislav, 1st degree, St. Vladimir of the Apostles, 3rd degree, and Saint Anne, 3rd degree.

On November 15, 1905, Ivan Sechenov died of lobar pneumonia and was buried at the Vagankovskoye cemetery. Many years later, the ashes of the great physiologist were transferred to the Novodevichy cemetery.

Sechenov left behind a colossal legacy in the field of psychology and medicine and many students. V.P. Pashutin, A.F. Samoilov, I.R. Tarkhanov and other scientists came from his school.

His student and friend Kliment Timiryazev wrote best about Sechenov: “Hardly any of the physiologists of his time... had such a wide scope in the field of his own research, starting with purely physical research in the field of dissolution of gases and ending with research in the field of nervous physiology and strictly scientific psychology... If we add to this the brilliant, remarkably simple, clear form in which he clothed his thoughts, then it becomes clear the wide influence that he had on Russian science, on Russian thought, even far beyond the boundaries of his audience and his specialties".

A monument was erected to Sechenov in his homeland, and in 1955 the Moscow Medical Institute was named after Sechenov.

An outbuilding and the remains of a manor park remained from the Sechenov estate. The wooden house currently houses the Ivan Sechenov Museum of Local Lore. The brothers and sisters, mother and father of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov were buried in the fence of the church in Teply Stan. In the early thirties, the church was closed and later, before the war, destroyed in 1939. The graves were also destroyed.

Text prepared by Andrey Goncharov

Used materials:

Materials from the site “Ask Alena” - “Biographies. Life history of great people"
Materials from the site KM.RU
Materials from the site “Sechenovsky municipal district of the Nizhny Novgorod region”

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1. Main part

1.1 Biography of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov

1.2 Discoveries and scientific works of I.M. Sechenov

1.3 Influence of works of I.M. Sechenov on the subsequent development of physiology

1.4 “Reflexes of the brain.” The main work of I.M. Sechenov

Conclusion

Introduction

Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov (1829-1905) - Russian scientist and materialist thinker, founder of the physiological school, corresponding member (1869), honorary member (1904) of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.

In his classic work “Reflexes of the Brain” (1866), Ivan Sechenov substantiated the reflex nature of conscious and unconscious activity and showed that psychological phenomena are based on physiological processes that can be studied by objective methods. He discovered the phenomena of central inhibition and summation in the nervous system, established the presence of rhythmic bioelectric processes in the central nervous system, and substantiated the importance of metabolic processes in the implementation of excitation.

Sechenov also investigated and substantiated the respiratory function of blood. The creator of the objective theory of behavior, laid the foundations of labor physiology, age-related, comparative and evolutionary physiology. Sechenov's works had a great influence on the development of natural science and the theory of knowledge.

The contribution of this scientist to science was aptly described by Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, who called Sechenov “the father of Russian physiology.” Indeed, with his name, physiology not only entered world science, but also took one of the leading places in it.

The purpose of the work is to identify the contribution made to the development of human and animal physiology by I.M. Sechenov.

The tasks to achieve the goal are:

Read the biography of I.M. Sechenov;

Consider the works in the field of physiology by I.M. Sechenov;

Evaluate the contribution of I.M. Sechenov into human and animal physiology as a science

Main part

1 Biography of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov

Born on August 13, 1829 in the village of Teply Stan, Simbirsk province (now the village of Sechenovo in the Nizhny Novgorod region). The son of a landowner and his former serf.

He graduated from the Main Engineering School in St. Petersburg in 1848. He served in the military in Kyiv, retired in 1850, and a year later entered the Faculty of Medicine at Moscow University, graduating with honors in 1856.

During an internship in Germany, he became close to S.P. Botkin, D.I. Mendeleev, composer A.P. Borodin, and artist A.A. Ivanov. Sechenov’s personality had such an influence on the Russian artistic intelligentsia of that time that N. G. Chernyshevsky copied his Kirsanov from him in the novel “What is to be done?”, and I. S. Turgenev - Bazarov (“Fathers and Sons”).

In 1860 he returned to St. Petersburg, defended his dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Medical Sciences and headed the department at the Medical-Surgical Academy, as well as a laboratory where research was carried out in the field of physiology, toxicology, pharmacology, and clinical medicine.

From 1876 to 1901 he taught at Moscow University. Sechenov devoted more than 20 years of his life to the study of gases and the respiratory function of blood, but his most fundamental works were studies of brain reflexes. It was he who discovered the phenomenon of central inhibition, called Sechenov inhibition (1863). At the same time, at the suggestion of N.A. Nekrasov, Sechenov wrote for the Sovremennik magazine an article “An attempt to introduce physiological principles into mental processes,” which the censorship did not allow for “propaganda of materialism.” This work, entitled “Reflexes of the Brain,” was published in the Medical Bulletin (1866).

In the 90s Sechenov turned to the problems of psychophysiology and theory of knowledge. The course of lectures he gave at Moscow University formed the basis of the “Physiology of Nerve Centers” (1891), which examines a wide range of nervous phenomena - from unconscious reactions in animals to higher forms of perception in humans. Then the scientist began research in a new field - labor physiology.

In 1901 Sechenov retired. His name was given to the 1st Moscow Medical Academy, the Institute of Evolutionary Physiology and Biochemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The Academy of Sciences established the Sechenov Prize, awarded every three years for outstanding research in physiology.

2 Discoveries and scientific works of I.M. Sechenov

Research and writings by I.M. Sechenov were devoted mainly to thermal problems: the physiology of the nervous system, the chemistry of respiration and the physiological foundations of mental activity. With his works I.M. Sechenov laid the foundation for Russian physiology and created a school of Russian physiologists, which played an important role in the development of physiology, psychology and medicine not only in Russia, but throughout the world. His work on the physiology of blood respiration, gas exchange, dissolution of gases in liquids and energy exchange laid the foundations for future aviation and space physiology.

Sechenov's dissertation became the first fundamental study in history of the effects of alcohol on the body. It is necessary to pay attention to the general physiological provisions and conclusions formulated in it: firstly, “all movements that are called voluntary in physiology are, in the strict sense, reflective”; secondly, “the most general character of normal brain activity (insofar as it is expressed by movement) is a discrepancy between excitation and the action it causes - movement”; And finally, “the reflex activity of the brain is more extensive than the spinal cord.”

Sechenov was the first to completely extract all their blood gases and determine their quantity in serum and erythrocytes. Particularly important results were obtained by I.M. Sechenov when studying the role of erythrocytes in the transfer and exchange of carbon dioxide. He was the first to show that carbon dioxide is found in erythrocytes not only in a state of physical dissolution and in the form of bicarbonate, but also in a state of unstable chemical compound with hemoglobin. On this basis, I.M. Sechenov came to the conclusion that red blood cells carry oxygen from the lungs to the tissues and carbon dioxide from the tissues to the lungs.

Together with Mechnikov, Sechenov discovered the inhibitory effect of the vagus nerve on the turtle’s heart. It turned out that with strong irritation of the sensory nerves, active motor reflexes arise, which are soon replaced by complete inhibition of reflex activity. The largest physiologist N.E. Vvedensky, a student of Sechenov, proposed calling it the Sechenov reflex.

In extremely subtle experiments, Sechenov made four sections of the brain of frogs and then observed how reflex movements changed under the influence of each of them. The experiments yielded interesting results: suppression of reflected activity was observed only after incisions of the brain immediately in front of the visual thalamus and in them themselves. Summing up the results of the first experiments - with sections of the brain, Sechenov expressed the idea of ​​​​the existence of centers in the brain that delay reflected movements: in a frog they are located in the visual thalamus.

Thus began the second series of experiments, during which Sechenov chemically irritated various parts of the frog’s brain with table salt. It turned out that salt applied to a cross section of the brain in the rhombic space always caused the same strong suppression of reflective activity as a section of the brain in this place. Suppression, but not so strong, was also observed with irritation of a transverse section of the brain behind the visual thalamus. Electrical stimulation of transverse sections of the brain gave the same results.

So, we can draw conclusions. Firstly, in the frog, the mechanisms that delay reflected movements lie in the optic thalamus and medulla oblongata. Secondly, these mechanisms should be considered as nerve centers. Thirdly, one of the physiological ways of excitation of these mechanisms to activity is represented by the fibers of sensory nerves.

These experiments by Sechenov culminated in the discovery of central inhibition, a special physiological function of the brain. The inhibitory center in the thalomic region is called the Sechenov center.

The discovery of the braking process was deservedly appreciated by his contemporaries. But the discovery that he also made during experiments with a frog, reticulospinal influences (the influence of the reticular formation of the brain stem on spinal reflexes) became widely recognized only starting in the 40s of the 20th century, after the function of the reticular formation of the brain was clarified.

Another discovery by a Russian scientist dates back to the 1860s. He proved that nerve centers have the ability “to sum up sensitive, individually ineffective, irritations into an impulse that gives movement, if these irritations follow each other often enough.” The phenomenon of summation is an important characteristic of nervous activity, first discovered by I.M. Sechenov in experiments on frogs, was then established in experiments on other animals, vertebrates and invertebrates, and acquired universal significance.

Observing the behavior and formation of a child, Sechenov showed how innate reflexes become more complex with age, interact with each other and create all the complexity of human behavior. He described that all acts of conscious and unconscious life, according to their mode of origin, are reflexes.

Sechenov said that the reflex lies at the basis of memory. This means that all voluntary (conscious) actions are reflected in the strict sense, i.e. reflex. Consequently, a person acquires the ability to group movements by repeating connecting reflexes. In 1866 A manual, Physiology of Nerve Centers, was published, in which Sechenov summarized his experience.

In the fall of 1889, at Moscow University, the scientist gave a course of lectures on physiology, which became the basis for the general work “Physiology of Nerve Centers” (1891). In this work, an analysis was carried out of various nervous phenomena - from unconscious reactions in spinal animals to higher forms of perception in humans. In 1894 He published “Physiological Criteria for Setting the Length of the Working Day,” and in 1901, “An Outline of Human Working Movements.”

THEM. Sechenov is one of the founders of Russian electrophysiology. His monograph On Animal Electricity (1862) was the first work on electrophysiology in Russia.

The name of Sechenov is associated with the creation of the first physiological scientific school in Russia, which was formed and developed at the Medical-Surgical Academy, Novorossiysk, St. Petersburg and Moscow universities. At the Medical-Surgical Academy, Ivam Mikhailovich introduced the method of demonstrating an experiment into lecture practice. This contributed to the close connection between the pedagogical process and research work and largely predetermined Sechenov’s success on the path of a scientific school.

The discoveries of I.M. Sechenov irrefutably proved that mental activity, like physical activity, is subject to well-defined objective laws, is caused by natural material causes, and is a manifestation of some special “soul”, independent of the body and the surrounding conditions. Thus, the religious-idealistic separation of the mental from the physical was put to an end and the foundations were laid for a scientific materialist understanding of human mental life. THEM. Sechenov proved that the first reason for every human action, deed, is rooted not in the inner world of a person, but outside it, in the specific conditions of his life and activity, and that without external sensory stimulation no thought is possible. With this I.M. Sechenov opposed the idealistic theory of “free will”, characteristic of a reactionary worldview.

Sechenov devoted the last years of his life to studying the physiological foundations of human work and rest. He discovered a lot of interesting things, and most importantly, he established that sleep and rest are different things, that eight-hour sleep is mandatory, that the working day should be eight hours. But as a physiologist, analyzing the work of the heart, he came to the conclusion that the working day should be even shorter.

3 The influence of the works of I.M. Sechenov on the subsequent development of physiology

Having established the reflex nature of mental activity, Sechenov gave a detailed interpretation of such fundamental concepts of psychology as sensations and perceptions, associations, memory, thinking, motor acts, and mental development in children. For the first time he showed that all human cognitive activity has an analytical-synthetic character of a psychological congress.

Based on the achievements of the physiology of the sense organs and research into the functions of the motor apparatus, Ivan Mikhailovich criticizes agnosticism and develops ideas about the muscle as an organ of reliable knowledge of the spatio-temporal relationships of things. According to Sechenov, sensory signals sent to a working muscle make it possible to build images of external objects, as well as to correlate objects with each other and thereby serve as the bodily basis of elementary forms of thinking.

These ideas about muscle sensitivity stimulated the development of modern teaching about the mechanism of sensory perception and became the basis for the ideas of I.P. Pavlov and his followers about the mechanisms of voluntary movements.

Such works by I.M. were of great importance for the development of Russian neurophysiology. Sechenov: “Physiology of the Nervous System) (1866) and especially “Physiology of Nerve Centers”, in which both the results of their own experiments and the data of other studies were summarized and critically analyzed. The idea developed in them that the regulatory activity of the uneven system is carried out reflexively became the leading one for a long time in all studies on the physiology of the central nervous system.

THEM. Sechenov armed Russian physiology with the correct methodology. Sechenov's main principle was consistent materialism, a strong belief that physiological phenomena are based on material physical and chemical processes. The second principle of scientific methodology I.M. Sechenov was that the study of all physiological phenomena should be carried out by the method of experiments. Electrophysiological work by I.M. Sechenov contributed to the spread of the electrophysiological method for studying the physiology of nerves, muscles and the nervous system.

4 “Reflexes of the brain.” The main work of I.M. Sechenov

In the spring of 1862, Professor of the Medical-Surgical Academy Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov received a year's leave and went abroad to Paris, where he worked in the laboratory of Claude Bernard. Here he makes the discovery of “central inhibition of reflexes.” And he is already considering the main provisions of his future work, called “Reflexes of the Brain.”

Autumn 1863 Sechenov publishes an article on his book. The scientist took it to Sovremennik. The original title of the article was “An attempt to reduce the methods of origin of mental phenomena to physiological bases.” In his work, Sechenov argued that all developed human mental activity is the brain’s response to external stimulation, and the end of any mental act will be the contraction of certain muscles.

Ivan Mikhailovich was the first physiologist who dared to begin the study of “mental” activity in the same ways that “bodily” activity was studied, moreover, the first who dared to reduce this mental activity to the same laws to which bodily activity is subject.

Due to censorship reasons, the editors of the magazine Sovremennik changed the title: “An attempt to introduce physiological principles into mental processes.” However, this did not help. The publishing world forbade Sechenov's work to be published in Sovremennik.

Despite the authorities' attempt to hide Sechenov's work from society, it very soon became available to a wide circle of readers. New ideas were talked about everywhere, new ideas were discussed. The progressive and thoughtful intelligentsia of Russia read Sechenov.

But the authorities thought differently. They were scared to death. As an “Inveterate Materialist,” “Nihilist Ideologist,” a professor under secret police surveillance publishes a book. And the authorities took the most urgent measures to prevent the author from putting his work into wider circulation.”

The case was transferred to the St. Petersburg District Court “with the most humble request for the prosecution of the author and publisher of the book “Reflexes of the Brain” and for the destruction of the book itself.”

The author was accused of the fact that “Reflexes of the Brain” allegedly subverted the concepts of good and evil and destroyed the moral foundations of society. The “case” ends up in the prosecutor’s office of the judicial chamber, which is forced to admit that “the mentioned essay by prof. Sechenov does not contain thoughts for the dissemination of which the author could be liable.” In turn, the Minister of Internal Affairs was forced to stop the prosecution. August 31, 1867 The book was released from custody and went on sale.

Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov acquired a reputation in government circles as a “notorious materialist”, an ideologist of forces hostile to the foundations of the state. It was this reputation that prevented his election as an adjutant of the Academy of Sciences and prevented his confirmation as a professor at Novorossiysk University.

Conclusion

With his works, I.M. Sechenov laid the foundation for Russian physiology and created the materialist school of Russian physiologists, which played an important role in the development of physiology, psychology and medicine not only in Russia, but throughout the world. K. A. Timiryazev and I. P. Pavlov called I. M. Sechenov “the pride of Russian thought” and “the father of Russian physiology.” To paraphrase Newton's words about Descartes, it can be argued that Sechenov is the greatest physiologist, on shoulders which Pavlov stands. “The honor of creating a truly large Russian physiological school and the honor of creating a direction that largely determines the development of world physiology belongs to Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov,” wrote the outstanding Soviet physiologist, academician L. A. Orbeli.

Today it is obvious that many modern branches of physiology - neurophysiology, physiology of work, sports and recreation, physicochemical (molecular) and biophysical directions in physiology, evolutionary physiology, physiology of higher nervous activity, cybernetics, etc. - have their roots in the discoveries of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov. His works constituted an entire era in physiology.

List of sources used

Anokhin P.K. “From Descartes to Pavlov.”-M. : Medgiz, 1945 M.B. Mirsky “I.M. Sechenov. People of Science."

Berezovsky V.A. Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov. Kyiv, 1984;

Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov. To the 150th anniversary of his birth / Ed. P.G. Kostyuk, S.R. Mikulinsky, M.G. Yaroshevsky. M., 1980.

Shikman A.P. Figures of Russian history. Biographical reference book. Moscow, 1997

Yaroshevsky M.G. Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov (1829-1905). - L.: Science (Lenigration department), 1968

Batuev A.S. Higher nervous activity. - M.: Higher School, 1991.

Batuev A.S., Sokolova L.V. On Sechenov’s teaching on the mechanisms of space perception.//Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov (To the 150th anniversary of his birth) - M.: Nauka, 1980.

Kostyuk P.G. Sechenov and modern neurophysiology.//Ivan Mikhailovich Se-chenov (To the 150th anniversary of his birth) - M.: Nauka, 1980.

Chernigovsky V.N. The problem of the physiology of sensory systems in the works of Sechenov.//Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov (To the 150th anniversary of his birth) - M.: Nauka, 1980. Sechenov physiology reflex

Sechenov I.M. Reflexes of the brain. - M.: Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1961.

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Sechenov Ivan Mikhailovich is a famous Russian physiologist, biologist and chemist. Over the years of his activity, he managed to make a significant contribution to the development of many scientific fields, including psychology, journalism and even anthropology. Many consider Ivan Mikhailovich one of the founders of the modern literary Russian language.

Sechenov's childhood years

Sechenov I.M. born on August 13, 1829 in the village of Teply Stan, which today is called the village of Sechenovo and is located in the Nizhny Novgorod region.

His father, Mikhail Alekseevich Sechenov, was a landowner and nobleman, and his mother was Anisya Egorovna, a former serf of his father. Ivan himself, remembering his family as an adult, admitted that most of all he loved his nanny Nastasya, who took care of him, protected him, spoiled him and knew many interesting fairy tales.

The Sechenov family, despite its social status, experienced certain difficulties with money, which is why young Ivan had to receive only home education, which did not prevent him from achieving great success in the future in a variety of areas of activity.

He was taught literacy, mathematics and natural sciences by his mother, who was fluent in Russian and living foreign languages, and dreamed of how one day her son would become a professor.

Youth and first successes

In 1848, Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov graduated from the Main Engineering School. Unfortunately, he failed to get into the upper officer class, and he was released from school with the rank of ensign. Young Sechenov failed to get into the active army in the Caucasus, and he served in the second reserve sapper battalion.

Two years later, he resigned and entered the medical faculty of Moscow University as a volunteer student. In addition to medical lectures, he also attended others, thanks to which he very quickly began to understand cultural studies, theology, philosophy, deontology, medieval and ancient medicine, and history. In his third year, his areas of interest expanded to psychology and physics.

Under the influence of A.I. Polunin, who was then the head of the department of pathological anatomy and physiology, as well as F.I. Inozemtsev. and Glebova I.T., Sechenov also became interested in physiology. At the insistence of the dean, he completed the full course of study, passed all the necessary exams and received a medical degree with honors.

In his 4th year of study, Ivan Mikhailovich had to survive the death of his mother. In memory of her, Sechenov, after passing the exams, went abroad with money received as an inheritance. He wanted to study physiology professionally, and thanks to his perseverance and determination, he was later able to make a significant contribution to this medical field.

Career blossoming

After his move abroad in 1856, Sechenov worked in the laboratories of many famous scientists, such as F. Hoppe-Seyler, Ernst Weber, Johann Muller, K. Ludwig, and many others.

He also managed to meet and make friends with A.N. Beketov, D.I. Mendeleev, S.P. Botkin, A.P. Borodin, N.V. Gogol. He worked with many of them on joint projects or provided them with all possible assistance, as was the case with A. Ivanov, with whom they worked together on the painting “The Appearance of Christ to the People.”

Sechenov’s lectures on “Animal Electricity,” which he read at the Medical-Surgical Academy, amazed not only the scientists around him, but also people so far from medicine as N.G. Chernyshevsky. and Turgenev I.S. Over the years of his activity, he managed to work in Paris in the laboratory of Claude Bernard, who became famous in the field of endocrinology.

In 1867, he began to actively promote the doctrine of self-regulation and feedback, as well as theories of cybernetics and automatic control. At the same time, he had to urgently go on vacation to Graz, to his Viennese friend and physiologist Alexander Rollet. This was due to the fact that an academician of the Medical-Surgical Academy turned to the Senate with a request to exile Sechenov to a monastery for harmful and soul-destroying teachings.

Ivan Mikhailovich also actively fought for women's rights and in 1870, as a sign of protest against female discrimination, he left the academy, after which he worked in Mendeleev's chemical laboratory and, at the same time, lectured at the artists' club.

From 1871 to 1888, he managed to change jobs several times: first he headed the department of physiology at the Novorossiysk University of Odessa, then he was a professor in the department of anatomy, physiology and histology in the department of zoology, Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of St. Petersburg University, where he even organized a separate physiological laboratory.

In 1889, Sechenov became president of the first International Psychological Congress in Paris, and also received the title of private assistant professor at Moscow University. Two years later he won the title of professor of physiology. In 1901, he officially retired, while continuing his research and teaching activities.

Outstanding Achievements

Over the years of his work and research, Sechenov accomplished many very important things that will forever remain in history, among them:

• – It was Sechenov who designed the “blood pump” necessary to study the effect of alcohol on blood gases.
• – He was the first to write and defend his doctoral dissertation in Russian on the topic “Materials for the future physiology of alcohol intoxication”, in 1860 at the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg.
• – Sechenov organized the first physiological laboratory in Russia at the Medical-Surgical Academy of St. Petersburg.
• – It was Sechenov who spread Darwinism in Russia and even brought the world’s first physicochemical and evolutionary theories, as well as the application of the ideas of Darwinism to problems of psychology and physiology.
• – He discovered the phenomenon of central inhibition, which was eventually called Sechenov inhibition, and spontaneous fluctuations of biocurrents in the medulla oblongata.
• – Sechenov turned physiology into an exact science and clinical discipline, which allowed medicine to take a significant step forward.

Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov was an outstanding scientist, psychologist, physician, biologist, physicist and distinguished professor. is integrally connected with constant learning, self-development and science. It’s not for nothing that he is called a genius, creator and father of Russian physiology! He lived 76 years, of which he devoted about 60 to education. How did the life of the future professor begin, and what did his love for knowledge lead to? Below is a short biography of Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov.

Childhood and youth

The biography of Ivan Sechenov began in the village of Teply Stan, Nizhny Novgorod region (now the village of Sechenov). In 1829, on August 13, the ninth child was born into the noble Sechenov family. Ivan hardly remembered his father; he was only 10 years old when he died. However, it was the father who instilled in the children from childhood that education is the most important thing (he himself was poorly educated, like his mother), and children should treat their teachers as benefactors.

At the insistence of his older brother, it was decided to send Ivan to an engineering school. That is why he lived in the village until he was 14 years old, studying at home, and was the only one of all who learned foreign languages. Further, Sechenov’s biography will be related to continuous education.

From the memoirs of Ivan Sechenov:

I was a very ugly boy, black, with curly hair and severely disfigured by smallpox, but I was probably not stupid, very cheerful and had the art of imitating gaits and voices, which often amused my family and friends. There were no boys the same age either in the families of acquaintances or in the household; I grew up all my life between women; therefore, I had neither boyish manners nor contempt for the female sex; Moreover, he was trained in the rules of politeness. For all these reasons, I enjoyed the love of my family and the favor of my acquaintances, not excluding ladies and gentlemen.

Let's look at how Sechenov's life developed further.

Education

At the age of 14, Ivan Mikhailovich entered the school of military engineers and left for St. Petersburg. The school had 4 junior classes, where training lasted 4 years, and 2 officer classes, where they ended up after. The institution maintained a military regime: waking up at 5 am, studying from 7 am and drill training. The boys also took an oath and were already considered civil servants, which spared them from corporal punishment.

In engineering school, the emphasis was on mathematics, drawing, algebra, geometry and trigonometry. In high school, he studied analytical mechanics, integral calculus, and French literature. But the main subject, which was taught throughout the 6 years of study, was fortification (the military engineering science of strengthening terrain for combat.) However, Sechenov was not interested in engineering sciences; even then he passionately fell in love with one subject - physics, where he made great progress. In high school, the boy showed interest in chemistry. As Ivan Mikhailovich himself admits in his memoirs:

Mathematics was good for me, and if I had gone straight from the engineering school to the university’s Faculty of Physics and Mathematics, I could have turned out to be a decent physicist, but fate, as we will see, decided otherwise.

After graduating from engineering school in 1848 with the rank of non-commissioned officer, Sechenov was assigned to Kyiv, to the 2nd reserve engineer battalion. Two years later, the newly minted officer resigns, with the firm intention of going to study medicine. He was prompted to take this step by meeting a young widow, Olga Alexandrovna, a very educated girl who was passionate about medicine. As Sechenov himself recalls an episode of his biography:

I entered her house as a young man, floating so inertly along the channel into which fate had thrown me, without a clear consciousness of where it could lead me, and I left her house with a ready-made life plan, knowing where to go and what to do. Who, if not she, brought me out of a situation that could have become a dead loop for me, indicating the possibility of a way out. To what, if not to her suggestions, do I owe the fact that I went to university - and precisely the one that she considered advanced! - to study medicine and help others. It is possible, finally, that some of her influence was reflected in my later service to the interests of women who were making their way onto an independent path.

With this intention, in 1850 Sechenov entered Moscow Medical University. 6 years of interesting learning, first discoveries and full awareness of the goals of his life await him. Although the meager medical theory initially disappointed the future scientist, he perfectly mastered biology, anatomy, surgery and physiology. In his third year at university, Sechenov became interested in psychology. At the same time, he was attracted by philosophy. Sechenov studied very willingly, which ultimately allowed him to graduate from the university in the top three students. After medical university in 1856, Ivan Mikhailovich left to study in Berlin.

Sechenov will stay abroad for 4 years, where his career will begin to blossom.

Career

In Berlin, the scientist works for a year, studying physics and chemistry. There he begins to work in famous laboratories. Next is Paris, where the discovery of so-called central inhibition was made - special mechanisms in the frog’s brain. Next come publications in medical journals; the work “Reflexes of the Brain” opened the term “reflex” to a wide audience. With this publication, the career of the future professor of physiology officially began.

In 1860, the scientist returned to St. Petersburg and defended his dissertation, receiving a degree. He worked at the academy for 10 years, making many discoveries in medicine and physics.

In 1869 he was already a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (after a number of discoveries in the theory of physiological solutions). At this time he was the head of the Department of Zoology and organized his own physiological laboratory.

In 1889, the professor became president of the first International Psychological Congress in Paris, at the same time receiving the title of associate professor at Moscow University.

In 1901, I.M. Sechenov received the title of professor of physiology and officially retired. Sechenov Ivan Mikhailovich will die in 4 years.

Personal life

Looking further at the short biography of I.M. Sechenov, it can be noted that upon his return from Berlin in St. Petersburg, he met Maria Alexandrovna Bokova. The girl dreamed of becoming a doctor, which was impossible in Russia. The road to science was closed to women at that time. Sechenov was always outraged by such injustice; he willingly takes the girl as a listener to his lectures. At the end of the course, he invites her to write a scientific paper. Maria will complete the work and successfully defend her doctoral dissertation in Germany. Later, this purposeful student would become his wife.

Proceedings

The professor worked in several main areas: physiology, biology and psychology. During his long scientific career, many articles were published in journals and several books were written.

We will consider the biography of I.M. Sechenov and his main works below:

• the book “Reflexes of the Brain” (1866) (now this book can be bought in any bookstore, it was republished in 2015);
• "Physiology of the Nervous System" (1866);
• the book "Elements of Thought" (1879), republished in 2014;
• “On the absorption of CO 2 by salt solutions and strong acids” (1888);
• "Physiology of Nerve Centers" (1891);
• “On alkalis of blood and lymph” (1893);
• "A device for the rapid and accurate analysis of gases" (1896);
• "Portable breathing apparatus" (1900);
• "Essay on Human Labor Movements" (1901);
• "Objective Thought and Reality" (1902);
• the book “Notes of a Russian Professor of Medicine” - an autobiographical work, the scientist’s memories of his childhood and years of study, republished in 2014;
• "Autobiographical Notes" (1904).

Achievements

Sechenov’s biography and the scientist’s contribution to science still arouses the interest of people all over the world. Ivan Mikhailovich created a physiological school, which during its existence made a number of discoveries that were most important for humanity. One of them is the concept of nonspecific brain systems.

A lot of research in the field of medicine has led to the discovery that red blood cells carry oxygen from the lungs to the tissues, and carbon dioxide from the tissues to the lungs. As a result of these discoveries, Sechenov developed the first portable breathing apparatus.

Professor Sechenov devoted a lot of time to psychology. His scientific work “Psychology of Thought” is still one of the most important in the study of human thinking.

One of the main achievements in the field of biology is the discovery of inhibitory action. He also identified the cause of motor reflexes.

Awards and titles

During his long life, Academician I.M. Sechenov made many important discoveries, many of which we still use in science and education. Streets and an institute are now named after Sechenov, a monument has been erected to him, his works are republished annually.

A scientist who lived more than a century ago “made” physiology an exact science. His discoveries in medicine made it possible to take a huge step forward in the future. The following are the titles and degrees of the scientist:

• Honored Professor of Moscow University;
• Academician of the Medical-Surgical Academy;
• Corresponding Member for Biological Discharge;
• honorary member of the Imperial St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences;
• Knight of the Imperial First Class;
• Knight of the Imperial Order of St. Anne, III degree;
• Knight of the Imperial Order of St. Vladimir, III degree;
• Doctor of Medicine degree;
• Doctor of Zoology degree.