John Burdon Sanderson Haldane made several important discoveries about human physiology and respiration.

Geneticist 1892-1964

John Burdon Sanderson Haldane was born on November 5, 1892. His father, John Scott Haldane, was a physiologist at Oxford University who worked on respiration and contributed to the safety of miners. The elder Haldane encouraged his son to assist him, and he was soon bringing the child down mine shafts during his experiments to prove that the air in them was breathable.

Haldane attended New College at Oxford on a mathematical scholarship and worked with the rediscovered laws of Mendelian genetics. It was while experimenting on his sister Naomi's guinea pig colony that he discovered genetic linkage. About the same time, in 1912, Haldane published his first of some 400 scientific articles, on hemoglobin binding of carbon monoxide.

One of Haldane's specialties was the physiology of gas absorption and binding...