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Ma Vie en Noir

Fifty Years with Melatonin and the Stone of Madness

  • Book
  • © 2016

Overview

Authors:
  1. Daniel Pedro Cardinali

    1. Facultad de Ciencias Médicas, Pontificia Univ Católica Argentina, Buenos Aires, Argentina

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  • Explores the history of pineal and melatonin, from the autobiographical perspective of a leading author in the field.
  • Focuses on the personal experience and achievements of Dr. Daniel Cardinali.
  • Discussion ranges from historical aspects to personal issues.
  • Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Part of the book series: Springer Biographies (SPRINGERBIOGS)

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Table of contents (15 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xiii
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Brief History of the Stone of Madness

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 1-8

  3. The Prescientific Stage of the Pineal Gland

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 9-21

  4. The Beginnings of the Pineal Scientific Era: From the Late Nineteenth Century to Melatonin’s Discovery

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 23-31

  5. Sleep/Wake Cycle: History and Facts

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 33-51

  6. When This Chronicler Enters the Story: The 1960s

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 53-60

  7. The Stone of Madness as a Neuroendocrine Organ and Model: The 1970s

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 61-85

  8. Peripheral Innervation of Neuroendocrine-Immune System: The Challenges to Change a Physiological Paradigm

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 87-113

  9. Melatonin as a Potential Therapeutic Agent: The 1980s

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 115-130

  10. Melatonin as a Chronobiotic That Opens the “Gates of Sleep”: The 1990s

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 131-154

  11. Melatonin and the “Diseases of the Soul”: The Stone of Madness Returns

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 155-169

  12. Twenty-First Century: The 24/7 Society as an Environmental Mutation

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 171-184

  13. Melatonin as a Medicament for the 24/7 Society: Metabolic Syndrome

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 185-213

  14. Melatonin as a Medicament for the 24/7 Society: Normal and Pathological Aging

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 215-243

  15. Melatonin as a Medicament for the 24/7 Society: Cancer

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 245-281

  16. Melatonin as a Nutraceutical

    • Daniel Pedro Cardinali
    Pages 283-288

  17. Back Matter

    Pages 289-301
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Keywords

About this book

I wrote this book urged by the overwhelming desire that arises towards the end of life to recapitulate the past. My goal was to summarize my experience of practicing science at the end of the 20th and early 21st centuries in Argentina, a country located far away from the world’s leading scientific centers. In the book, I summarize the intricacies of the pineal gland (“the stone of madness”) as historical, mystical and medical entity and its entry in contemporary medicine with the description of melatonin. I also reflect on how being associated with an unexplored subject at the beginning of his scientific career impacts the life of a scientist throughout their entire life. Today we know that in humans pineal melatonin is released every day late in the evening, and there is evidence that it is the trigger for the sleep process. But the most exciting aspect of melatonin is that it is a substance that is present in all living creatures, from unicellular organisms to plants and higher mammals, a fact that evinces its importance for life. Further, the neuroprotective action of melatonin promises to be crucial for the control of neurodegenerative diseases we face as a pandemic in this century. The discoverer of melatonin, Aaron Lerner, based its name on melano, the Greek word for black, because of its effect on the pigment cells of the skin. As in "La vie en rose", the immortal Edith Piaf song written in 1946, my lifelong work with melatonin could well be called "Ma vie en noir".

Authors and Affiliations

  • Facultad de Ciencias Médicas, Pontificia Univ Católica Argentina, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    Daniel Pedro Cardinali

About the author

Dr. Daniel Pedro Cardinali completed his MD and PhD degrees at the University del Salvador, Buenos Aires. During 1971 and 1972 he was Research Assistant at the Department of Nutrition and Food Science, MIT, USA. Since 1973 he has been a Research Career Awardee of the Argentine National Research Council, being promoted to its highest stage (Superior Investigator) in 1992. From 1986 to 2008 he was Professor of Physiology at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Buenos Aires, being nominated as Professor Emeritus in 2010. Since 2009 he has been Director of Teaching & Research at the Faculty of Medical Sciences, Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina, Buenos Aires.
Dr. Cardinali’s fields of interest include the Physiology and Pharmacology of Melatonin and Biologic Rhythms, and their relationships with Sleep Medicine. The most relevant awards and honors he has received include the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, New York (1977), the Curt P. Richter Prize, International Society of Psychoneuroendocrinology (1983), honorary doctorates in Medicine from Complutense University, Madrid, Spain (1991) and the University of Salamanca, Spain (1998), and membership in the Royal Academy of Medicine, Spain (1991). In 2007 he was awarded the Scopus Prize, Elsevier, Amsterdam, for being the most-cited Argentine scientist in biomedicine, and the Argentine Government’s Bernardo Houssay Award. In 2008 he received the Aaron B. Lerner Pioneer Award in Recognition of Outstanding Contributions to the Field of Melatonin Research, Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB).




Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Ma Vie en Noir

  • Book Subtitle: Fifty Years with Melatonin and the Stone of Madness

  • Authors: Daniel Pedro Cardinali

  • Series Title: Springer Biographies

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41679-3

  • Publisher: Springer Cham

  • eBook Packages: Medicine, Medicine (R0)

  • Copyright Information: Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-41678-6Published: 20 September 2016

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-3-319-82409-3Published: 09 September 2018

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-41679-3Published: 12 September 2016

  • Series ISSN: 2365-0613

  • Series E-ISSN: 2365-0621

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: XIII, 301

  • Number of Illustrations: 91 b/w illustrations, 28 illustrations in colour

  • Topics: Internal Medicine, Human Physiology, Popular Science in Medicine and Health

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