Angelo Dubini

Angelo Dubini (December 8 1813 - March 28 1902) was an Italian physician who earned his doctorate from the University of Pavia in 1837 and spent most of his professional career at the Ospedale Maggiore in Milan. In 1865 he became head physician and director of the dermatology department at Maggiore.

Dubini is remembered for his discovery of an intestinal parasite he named Anchylostoma duodenale. He first noticed the parasite in 1838 during an autopsy of a peasant woman who died of pneumonia. He would rediscover the parasite in the course of other autopsies in ensuing years. In 1843 he published his findings in Annali universali di medicina. Further research done by physicians Wilhelm Griesinger, Theodor Maximilian Bilharz, and Otto Eduard Heinrich Wucherer was able to confirm the parasites' pathogenicity in cases of chlorosis, which would probably be called iron deficiency anemia today.

Published works:

• Nuovo verme intestinale umano (Anchylostoma duodenale), cinstituente un sesto genere di nematoidei proprii dell’uomo. Annali universali di medicina, Milano, 1843, 106: 4-13.
• Primi cenni sulla corea elettrica. Annali universali di medicina, Milano, 1846, 117: 5-50.
• Entozoografia umana per servire di complemento agli studi d’anatomica patologica. Milano, 1850.
• Dell arte di fare le sezioni cadaveriche. Indices nosologici ordine alphabetico adnotationibus therapeuticis accomodati. Milano, 1859.

Source:

• Who Named It?, Angelo Dubini