Guinea Pig Scientists: Bold Self-experimenters in Science and Medicine by Leslie Dendy and Mel Boring. Henry Holt, 2005. 214pp. ISBN 0-8050-7316-7.

SB&F review:

Imagine sitting in a 260 degree room fully clothed while watching eggs and steak cook until overdone. Sounds a bit zany, or at least dangerous, but this experiment was done in the name of science. How else could one test the body's tolerance to heat? This is just the first of several fascinating stories of human guinea pigs who have tested the limits of the human body for the sake of science.
Starting with Sir Charles Blagden, M.D. and his heat experiments, the stories are chronologically ordered from the 1770's to 1989. Included are descriptions of experiments dealing with digestion, laughing gas, vaccinations, mosquitoes as Yellow fever vectors, radioactivity, G-forces and the effects of isolation on the body's internal clock. Renowned scientists such as Marie and Pierre Curie, Walter Reed and Werner Forssmann share pages of the book with lesser known, but equally brave, scientists.
Included in each chapter are numerous side-bars with specific scientific explanations, such as the properties of carbon dioxide or the physiology of food digestion, as well as some interesting biographical tidbits about the scientists. Photographs and/or drawings of the scientist at work lend realism to the story and a face to the name. The chapters end with a section titled "Now We Know". Here the authors comment on what the scientists did right or wrong in light of current knowledge and explain the latest research on the topic. The bulleted list is a nice wrap-up to the story giving the reader the sense of the importance of the experiments. Our modern society owes these guinea pig scientists a lot - without them we might not have safe seat belts for our cars, x-ray machines, safe air in our mines, or even anesthesia.
A timetable at the end of the book provides a list of dozens more examples of guinea pig scientists. Different typsettings differentiates events - those described in the book, additional experiments of interest but not described and major events in science and medicine which helps put the guinea-pig stories in historical context. An extensive section of notes and complete bibliography attest to the in-depth research carried out by the authors. Overall an extremely interesting book - perfect for a course on the history of science, as great examples of the scientific method in action, or as an honest tribute to some remarkable scientists.

About the authors:

Leslie Dendy has been teaching biology and chemistry, primarily at the University of New Mexico-Los Alamos, for nearly thirty years. She is the author of Tracks, Scats, and Signs, as well as numerous science-related articles for both children and adults. She first got the idea for this book in 1987, and she and Mel Boring have since spent more than ten years researching it. Amazingly, though, they have yet to meet in person. They promised themselves a "real, face-to-face meeting" upon completion of the book. Dr. Dendy lives with her husband in Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Mel Boring does not, in truth, live up to his name. He has been, variously, a one-room-school teacher, a junior high and high school school teacher, and the editor of a children's literature Web site. He is also the author of several nonfiction picture books, including Caterpillars, Bugs and Butterflies, and the novel The Rainmaker. His wife and his children, with their great enthusiasm for the project, served as inspirations as he worked on this book with Leslie Dendy. Mr. Boring lives in Rockford, Iowa, with his family.

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