Background

Alexander Solomon Wiener was born on March 16, 1907, in New York City, New York, United States. He was a son of George Wiener, an attorney, and Mollie (Zuckerman) Wiener.

Education

Initially, Alexander attended Brooklyn public schools, graduating from Brooklyn Boys' High School at the age of fifteen. In 1926, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Cornell University. Later, Wiener continued his education at Long Island College of Medicine (present-day SUNY Downstate College of Medicine), graduating with a Doctor of Medicine degree in 1930.

Both in high school and in college, Alexander pursued an interest in Mathematics. Also, in high school, Alexander took courses in Analytic Geometry and Calculus and was a member of the Mathematics team and president of the Mathematics club. He continued his study of Mathematics at Cornell University and contributed mathematical problems to the "American Mathematical Monthly". However, he majored in biology, receiving his Bachelor of Arts degree.

Later, in 1969, Wiener was awarded a Doctor Honoris Causa degree by the University of Toulouse.

Career

While Alexander was a student of a medical school, he began his first research on blood groups at the Jewish Hospital of Brooklyn, where he would also intern from 1930 to 1932 and with which he would be affiliated for his entire professional career. From 1933 to 1935, Wiener served as a head of the Division of Genetics and Biometrics, from 1932 to 1952, as a head of the blood transfusion division, and thereafter, from 1952 till 1976, as an attending immunohematologist. Between 1949 and 1952, Alexander was also affiliated with Adelphi Hospital, serving there as a head of the blood transfusion division.

In addition, Wiener began a private medical practice in 1932, but three years later, in 1935, he founded Wiener Laboratories, where he limited his practice to clinical pathology and blood grouping. In 1938, he joined the faculty of the Department of Forensic Medicine of New York University School of Medicine, moving up the academic ranks to professor by 1968. In 1938, Alexander also began his longtime association with the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of New York City.

The background to the discovery of the Rh factor lay in earlier discoveries, concerning the nature of blood. In 1901, Karl Landsteiner distinguished four main human blood groups: A, B, AB and O. These classifications refer to antigens (substances that produce antibodies) on the surface of the red blood cells. Blood type A contains the A antigen, B contains the B antigen, AB contains both, and O contains neither. However, in the 1920's, other blood factors or antigens were discovered — M, N and P.

In the 1930's, Wiener began collaborating with Landsteiner, who was affiliated with the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in New York. In 1937, Landsteiner and Wiener were studying the M factor in apes and monkeys, focussing on its action as an agglutinogen (its ability to clump red blood cells together). They showed, that different anti-M sera (blood sera samples with antibodies, opposing the M antigen) produced different reactions, and concluded, that there were at least five distinct M blood factors. This led to further experimentation, in which they tested the sera of rabbits, immunized with rhesus monkey blood cells. The antibodies, produced by rabbit blood in response to rhesus monkey antigens, led them to believe, that unknown blood factors might be discovered in human blood by the same method. They began experiments, using human blood and the antisera from rhesus blood, and thereby discovered a new antigen, that they called the Rh factor. The importance of this discovery in transfusions was recognized in 1939, when it was understood, that although the first transfusion of Rh-positive blood into an Rh-negative person may be harmless, the sensitization, that resulted, meant, that a second transfusion could cause a dangerous hemolytic reaction, involving the damage or destruction of red blood cells.

Wiener then studied the sera from Rh negative patients, who had hemolytic transfusion reactions, and the sera from Rh-negative mothers of erythroblastotic babies. These babies have Rh positive blood, some of which enter the mother’s blood, usually shortly before or during birth. The mother’s blood forms an antibody to the Rh factor and crosses back to the fetal blood supply. The result is the damage or destruction of the fetal red blood cells containing the Rh antigen. Alexander discovered, that the expected Rh antibodies often could not be found. He hypothesized, that there must be two different forms of Rh antibodies, one, that caused the agglutination of cells (which he called bivalent antibodies), the other capable of coating the red blood cells without clumping them (which he called univalent or blocking antibodies). In 1944 and 1945, Alexander developed tests for both types of antibodies.

Wiener noted the fallacy of assuming a one-to-one correspondence between antigens and antibodies. One antigen could produce multiple blood specificities. He soon discovered additional Rh factors, that were related to the original one. In the human Rh system (now known as the Rh-Hr system), Wiener and others established as many as twenty-five different blood factors, that form the basis of a large number of blood types.

Wiener’s research had many practical implications. It led to an understanding of erythroblastosis fetalis, for which Wiener himself devised (1944-1946) a treatment by means of a complete exchange transfusion, replacing the damaged Rh-positive blood of the infant with Rh-negative blood. This treatment led to a significant decline in the rate of infant mortality. Knowledge of Rh factors also made blood transfusions far safer.

Other implications of Wiener’s research derived from the fact, that all blood factors are inherited in predictable fashion, and that they combine in a highly specific way in individuals, allowing a sophisticated method of "fingerprinting". Blood factor analysis became important in legal matters (such as establishing paternity), as well as criminal matters, such as the use of blood for identification in homicide and assault. It also facilitated advances in physical anthropology — different groups of people have different proportions of various blood factors, so that tribal movements can sometimes be traced by analysis of blood factor percentages in populations.

Wiener was also a member of the American Medical Association legal committee, that sponsored blood test laws in all states, and he was the co-author of its 1935 report.

Achievements

• Alexander Solomon Wiener was a prominent immunohematologist, who was mostly known for discovering of Rhesus factor in 1937. Also, his subsequent pioneer work led to the development of exchange transfusion methods, that saved the lives of countless infants with hemolytic disease of the newborn.
  
  Moreover, Wiener was instrumental in the passage of the New York State law, allowing blood tests in disputed paternity cases. He and his father, attorney George Wiener, assisted in drafting a number of laws, concerning blood testing, that became part of the New York State domestic relations, civil and criminal codes.
  
  During his career, the scientist received several awards, including Alvarenga Prize in 1945, Albert Lasker Award in 1946 and Passano Foundation Award in 1951.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Blood Groups And Blood Transfusion

    (This book is about blood groups, sources of error in bloo...)

    1943
  • Heredity of the Blood Groups 1958
  • An Rh-Hr Syllabus: The Types and Their Applications 1954
  • A-B-O Blood Groups and Lewis Types: Questions and Answers, Problems and Solutions: A Teaching Manual 1976

Membership

Wiener was a member of the American Society of Human Genetics, American Association of Immunologists, American Association of Blood Banks, Blood Banks Association of New York State, Academy des Sciences, Inscriptions et Belle Lattres (Toulouse, France), Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, Phi Beta Kappa, Alpha Omega Alpha and other organizations. Also, he was also an honorary member of the Mystery Writers of America.

Personality

Wiener liked playing the piano, going to the movies and playing cards. He also enjoyed tennis and golf. In addition, he continued his lifelong interest in Mathematics and Physics by avidly reading in these areas.

Interests

• Sport & Clubs

  Tennis and golf

Connections

Alexander married Gertrude Rodman on June 15, 1932. Their marriage produced two children — Jane Helen and Barbara Rae.

Father:

George Wiener

Mother:

Mollie (Zuckerman) Wiener

child:

Jane Helen Wiener

child:

Barbara Rae Wiener

Wife:

Gertrude Rodman

colleague:

Karl Landsteiner