Shih-Chun Wang (1910-1993) was a

Chinese-American Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from m ...

medical doctor,

neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist who has specialised knowledge in neuroscience, a branch of biology that deals with the physiology, biochemistry, psychology, anatomy and molecular biology of neurons, neural circuits, and glial ...

, and pharmacology professor.

Early life and education

Wang was born on January 25, 1910, in

Tientsin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popul ...

, China. He attended

Yenching University Yenching University (), was a university in Beijing, China, that was formed out of the merger of four Christian colleges between the years 1915 and 1920. The term "Yenching" comes from an alternative name for old Beijing, derived from its status ...

in Beijing where he received a bachelor of science in 1931 before going to

Peking Union Medical College Peking Union Medical College (), founded in 1906, is a selective public medical college based in Dongcheng, Beijing, China. It is a Chinese Ministry of Education Double First Class University Plan university. The school is tied to the Peking Un ...

to earn his medical degree in 1935. In 1937, Wang received a Rockefeller Foundation fellowship to travel to the United States to study neurology at

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

Evanston, Illinois Evanston ( ) is a city, suburb of Chicago. Located in Cook County, Illinois, United States, it is situated on the North Shore along Lake Michigan. Evanston is north of Downtown Chicago, bordered by Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, ...

. He worked under the direction of S.W. Ransom at the Institute of Neurology in the

Northwestern University Medical School Northwestern or North-western or North western may refer to: * Northwest, a direction * Northwestern University, a private research university in Evanston, Illinois ** The Northwestern Wildcats, this school's intercollegiate athletic program ** ...

where he received his Ph.D. in 1940. While still a student at Northwestern, Wang married the former Mamie Kwoh, a registered nurse from China.

Career

From 1941 until 1956 he was a member of

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

's Department of Physiology, and after that he joined its Department of Pharmacology. He was the first person to be its Gustavus A. Pfeiffer Professor of Pharmacology, and he retired in 1978. Wang was elected a member of Academia Sinica in 1958. His research into

motion sickness Motion sickness occurs due to a difference between actual and expected motion. Symptoms commonly include nausea, vomiting, cold sweat, headache, dizziness, tiredness, loss of appetite, and increased salivation. Complications may rarely include de ...

led to the creation of drugs to prevent problems such as vomiting. He studied nausea in astronauts for

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

, which helped lead to the creation of the

vomit comet A reduced-gravity aircraft is a type of fixed-wing aircraft that provides brief near-weightless environments for training astronauts, conducting research and making gravity-free movie shots. Versions of such airplanes were operated by the NAS ...

. Surgeon Commander Christopher J. Davis OBE of the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

wrote in 1995, "Shih-Chun Wang who, in conjunction with Herbert Borison in 1950, had published the last major development in ideas concerning the mechanism of vomiting control."

Later life

After moving to New York City, Wang's wife Mamie taught nursing courses at the

Cornell School of Nursing The Cornell University School of Nursing was a nursing school in New York City founded in 1877 as the New York Hospital Training School for Nurses; it closed in 1979. The school awarded a Bachelor of Nursing degree after five years of study, two in ...

and helped develop the training program for

nurse practitioner A nurse practitioner (NP) is an advanced practice registered nurse and a type of mid-level practitioner. NPs are trained to assess patient needs, order and interpret diagnostic and laboratory tests, diagnose disease, formulate and prescribe ...

s. Shih-Chun and Mamie had two daughters. One daughter,

Phyllis Wise Phyllis M. Wise (Chinese name 王斐丽) is a biomedical researcher. Most recently, she is currently serving as the inaugural Chief Executive Officer and President of Colorado Longitudinal Study. Family and education Wise is the daughter of M ...

, followed in her parents’ footsteps and went on to become a medical research scientist, and later became a university administrator who led several large universities. Wang died on June 6, 1993, in a hospital in Englewood, New Jersey.

Awards and honors

In 1951 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship. Wang also received the

Sigma Xi Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society () is a highly prestigious, non-profit honor society for scientists and engineers. Sigma Xi was founded at Cornell University by a junior faculty member and a small group of graduate students in 1886 ...

Award at Northwestern University, a

Commonwealth Foundation The Commonwealth Foundation (CF) is an intergovernmental organisation that was established by the Commonwealth Heads of Government in 1966, a year after its sister organisation, the Commonwealth Secretariat. The Foundation is located at Mar ...

Fellowship, and an American Chinese Medical Society Scientific Achievement Award. He was elected a member of

Academic Sinica Academia Sinica (AS, la, 1=Academia Sinica, 3=Chinese Academy; ), headquartered in Nangang, Taipei, is the national academy of Taiwan. Founded in Nanking, the academy supports research activities in a wide variety of disciplines, ranging from ...

and was an honorary member of the Chinese Pharmacological Society.

Selected publications

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wang, Shih-Chun 1910 births 1993 deaths American academics of Chinese descent American neuroscientists Chinese emigrants to the United States Chinese neuroscientists Northwestern University alumni Biologists from Tianjin Columbia University faculty Educators from Tianjin Yenching University alumni Members of Academia Sinica