History of biochemistry
The term “biochemistry” itself is derived from the combining form "bio-", meaning "life", and "chemistry". The word is first recorded in English in 1848, while in 1877, Felix Hoppe-Seyler used the term ("Biochemie" in German) in the foreword to the first issue of "Zeitschrift für Physiologische Chemie" (Journal of Physiological Chemistry) as a synonym for physiological chemistry and argued for the setting up of institutes dedicate to its studies. Nevertheless, several sources cite German chemist Carl Neuberg as having coined the term for the new discipline in 1903, and some credit it to Franz Hofmeister.
History of biochemistry
The term "metabolism" is derived from the Greek Μεταβολισμός – Metabolismos for "change", or "overthrow". The history of the scientific study of metabolism spans 800 years. The earliest of all metabolic studies began during the early thirteenth century (1213-1288) by a Muslim scholar from Damascus named Ibn al-Nafis. al-Nafis stated in his most well-known work "Theologus Autodidactus" that "that body and all its parts are in a continuous state of dissolution and nourishment, so they are inevitably undergoing permanent change." Although al-Nafis was the first documented physician to have an interest in biochemical concepts, the first controlled experiments in human metabolism were published by Santorio Santorio in 1614 in his book "Ars de statica medecina". This book describes how he weighed himself before and after eating, sleeping, working, sex, fasting, drinking, and excreting. He found that most of the food he took in was lost through what he called "insensible perspiration".