John Scott Haldane is revered for his key advancements in respiratory physiology. Born into an affluent Scottish family, Haldane's father, Robert, worked as a lawyer and writer to the signet of Edinburgh, and his older brother Richard Burdon was the Viscount Haldane of Cloan. His advanced education took place at Edinburgh Academy and Edinburgh University, where he received a degree in medicine in 1884. Further education took place at Jena and Berlin.

Research became Haldane's passion as he began his first work on the composition of air in homes and schools at Dundee a piece that would be published in 1887. In the same year, he made his final professional move as he established a position at Oxford as demonstrator in physiology alongside his uncle. As Haldane refused to accept unproven distinctions between applied science and that based on speculation, he launched into his work on the relation between the...