Adolf Noreen was born in Östra Ämtervik in Värmland and defended his thesis Fryksdalsmålets ljudlära in 1877. The thesis deals with the dialect from his homeland and was the first dialect description based on scientific principles.
Noreen published handbooks on language history, for example on Old Icelandic in Altisländische Grammatik (1884) and on Old Swedish in Altschwedische Grammatik (1904).
In his major work Vårt språk (1903-1924) he sets out his basic view of language and presents a blueprint for grammar. Noreen was also one of the driving forces behind the spelling reform of 1906.
Between 1887-1919 Adolf Noreen was professor of Nordic languages, was elected member of the Academy of Sciences in 1902, member of the Academy of Sciences in 1917 and became member of the Swedish Academy in 1919.
Together with Johan August Lundell, he founded Upsala Enskilda Läroverk (now Lundellska Skolan) in 1892. Adolf Noreen was a very popular teacher and worked in a time that can be considered a golden age of linguistics.
Frithiof Holmgren established Sweden's first physiological laboratory in 1862 and became the country's first professor of physiology at the age of 33. He was also one of the most prominent teachers of his time at Uppsala University.
He became a world-famous scientist with the discovery of the retinal blood flow in the eye.
The studies of color blindness made Holmgren internationally known and in 1874 he described his method of using differently colored "sequined dolls", the so-called wool yarn test, to detect color blindness.
The method was of great practical importance for people in signal service, such as railway staff and seamen. A train accident in Lagerlunda in 1875 was suspected to have been caused by the inability of a dead engineer to distinguish between red and green. No one had considered that color vision could be important for railway personnel.
The equipment used by Holmgren to discover the retinal current, the electrical response of the retina to light. The equipment consists of a mirror galvanometer and a light catcher with a clockwork that drives the mirror. Photo: Museum of Medical History in Uppsala.
Sefirgarns dolls for carrying out the test of color vision developed by Holmgren, which became compulsory for all those to be employed in rail and maritime traffic. Photo: Museum of Medical History in Uppsala.
A more macabre study undertaken by Holmgren focused on whether beheading was a painless method of execution. Holmgren therefore attended four beheadings to examine the method from a physiological point of view. According to Holmgren, the case studies showed that beheading as a method met the requirements of painlessness. When the study was completed, he was also present at the execution of the so-called Alfta murderer in Gävle in 1893.
Holmgren also participated in the debates in Verdandi, and his radical stance was reflected in his dictation to the minutes of the consistory:
"I hold freedom of thought to be one of man's most precious privileges, and the university in which the principle of freedom of thought is not paramount does not, in my opinion, fulfill its task. To educate the young people studied to become thinking men should, in my opinion, be one of the main tasks of the university".
Frithiof Holmgren also emphasized the importance of physical education and founded the Studenternas Sharpshooting Association, the Studenternas Gymnastics Association and was chairman of the folk dance association Philochoros and promoter of the Uppsala Swimming Society.
Åke Holm was born in Norrtälje and later in life became Sweden's foremost arachnologist (spider researcher) and he is considered the creator of modern spider embryonology.
He published a number of important works on embryology and taxonomy and led research trips to Abisko and the Torneträsk area, East Africa, Spitsbergen, Greenland and Malaysia. Holm's spider research focused in particular on the Swedish mountain fauna and on the fauna of the Arctic and East Africa. One of the results was that new species were discovered.
Åke Holm with participants on one of the research trips to East Africa. Photo: The Museum of Evolution in Uppsala.
Olle Hedberg who participated in one of the research trips to East Africa. Photo: The Museum of Evolution in Uppsala.
Åke Holm was curator at the Department of Zoology 1947-1975 and as curator at the Zoological Museum he was in charge of the collections dating from the time of Linnaeus and Thunberg.
Robin Fåhræus was born in Stockholm and was Professor of Pathology from 1928 to 1955.
With his epoch-making investigations into the suspension stability of red blood cells (the so-called sink), Fåhræus has achieved international renown.
In his 1921 paper, The SuspensionStability of the blood, the rate at which blood cells sink to the bottom of a test tube and the sinking reaction (SR, "sinking") as a sensitive if non-specific indication of ongoing disease processes in the body was launched.
Together with The Svedberg, Fåhræus contributed to the determination of the molecular mass of hemoglobin.
Examples of his lifelong writing include the books Blood in the History of Medicine (1924) and History of Medicine (1944-1950).
Fåhræus, together with Anders Diös, was responsible for the restoration of the Hall of State at Uppsala Castle.
Image description: Robin Fåhraeus at the University House, Uppsala 1955. Photo: Uppsala-Bild / Upplandsmuseet. [The image is cropped] Click here for an uncropped image
Fredrik Tamm was born in Tveta in Södermanland and in 1875 he defended his thesis on Swedish etymology, which is the study of the historical origins of words, and compiled the Etymological Swedish Dictionary up to and including the letter K.
Tamm devoted himself in particular to etymological work and Swedish dictionary theory. For many years Tamm deputized for the ailing professor of Swedish language, Frits Läffler. Between 1883-1898 Tamm was acting professor of Swedish language for a total of ten years.
Uppsala University tried to establish a professorship for Tamm, but it was not granted by the Royal Majesty. Maj:t, probably because at the time there was already a professor of Nordic languages and one of Swedish. In 1897, Tamm was instead given the name, honor and dignity of professor.
Soon afterwards, Tamm's wife passed away and he was diagnosed with facial cancer. The surgery he underwent left his speech severely impaired.
On his birthday, March 30, 1905, he died and Nathan Söderblom gave the eulogy in which it was said:
"No one could be a better listener than he, whether it was for funny stories or scientific lectures, which he faithfully attended to the end whenever they were offered".
Image description: Fredrik Tamm with his wife Augusta Josefina Elisabeth Lundqvist, Uppsala 1894. Photo: Alfred Dahlgren / UUBThe image is cropped] Click here for an uncropped image
Finn Malmgren was born in Gothenburg. In 1912, Malmgren enrolled at Uppsala University, where he later earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics, physics and chemistry.
Malmgren later participated in the polar explorer Roald Amundsen's Arctic expedition as assistant to the scientist Harald Ulrik Sverdrup.
On board the ship Maud, they left Nome, Alaska, in the summer of 1922 and, after spending three and a half years in the pack ice, returned to Alaska in August 1925. Together they managed to collect a large amount of research material and numerous observations.
In 1927, Malmgren defended his thesis on the properties of sea ice. Malmgren later became an associate professor of meteorology.
Finn Malmgren, May 1925, in front of the magnetic observation field. Photo: Stockholm University.
Finn Malmgren, May 1925 at his hoarfrost recorder. Photo: Harald Ulrik Sverdrup / Stockholm University.
During the North Pole expedition with the airship Italia in 1928, it crashed on the ice north of Spitsbergen. After a long hike, Finn Malmgren died and his remains were left on the ice. Parts of the expedition were rescued by the Russian icebreaker Krassin.
Malmgren's name is on the Västmanland-Dala nation's Burial site and a statue of him, by sculptor Nils Sjögren, was erected in 1931 in Börjeparken next to Västmanland-Dala nation. The Department of Earth Sciences at Uppsala University awards a prize in his memory every three years for "contributions to Arctic research".
Axel W. Persson was born in Kvidinge and was interested in archaeology from an early age.
Persson's studies and interest in the Greek language led him to become an associate professor of Greek language and literature in 1915, and of classics and ancient history in 1921. In Uppsala, Persson became professor of classics and ancient history in 1924.
Persson was the leader of successful excavations in Greece (Asine 1922-1930, Dendra and Midea 1926-1927, 1937 and 1939 and in Berbati 1936-1937) and Turkey (Milas 1938 and Labraynda 1948-1950).
Of particular note was the uncovered dome tomb at Dendra , with treasures from Mycenaean times, excavated in 1926. The discovery was described as the largest archaeological find after Tutankhamun's tomb in Egypt. The tomb contained a king, a queen and a princess. In addition, precious grave goods such as gold swords and precious metal bowls were found. The finds from the dome tomb ended up in the National Museum of Athens. Persson's findings were published in scientific monographs such as The Royaltombs at Dendra near Midea (1931). This work is considered a classic.
Together with his wife, he made an important humanitarian contribution to Greece during the Second World War in the service of the Red Cross.
After the end of the Second World War, Persson carried out new excavations. In Labraynda, the aim was to find the origins of the Minoan culture. However, a temple site of classical and Roman times was found. Soon after, Persson died of a stroke.
Between 1924 and 1951, Axel W. Persson was professor of classical archaeology and, through his discoveries, his writing and his lectures, made classical archaeology known and appreciated in Sweden. Persson was awarded the Övralid Prize.
At the time of his death, Persson was considered one of the world's leading archaeologists. He is also the father of Viktor Persson, better known as Bok-Viktor.
For the first four years, Hans Rosling lived in the Luthagen district, after which the family moved to Svartbäcken in Uppsala. After graduating from high school, Rosling studied statistics and medicine at Uppsala University. During a trip to Asia in 1972, his interest in public health led to a course in social medicine at St. John's Medical College in Bangalore, India.
After graduating in 1975 and working as an intern in Hudiksvall, he furthered his education and gained expertise in tropical medicine at Uppsala University in 1977.
From 1979 to 1981, the Roslings worked in Nacala Porto in northern Mozambique, where Hans was a district doctor and his wife Agneta a midwife. In 1981, an epidemic of a previously unknown spastic paralysis disease broke out in the Nacala district, affecting more than 1,500 people, mostly women and children. The paralysis was linked to a very aggressive and highly monotonous diet consisting of a toxic form of cassava.
Rosling described the disease in his doctoral thesis and named it Konzo. This means 'bound bones' in the Congolese language where the disease was once described in 1938. During the 1980s, there were several Konzo outbreaks in other African countries.
From 1983 to 1996, Rosling worked as a teacher and researcher at Uppsala University in collaboration with several universities in Africa and Asia. In 1997 he was appointed Professor of International Health at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.
In 1999, Rosling began lecturing with a new kind of animated bubble chart that showed the socio-economic state of the world and trends over time. The program was called Trendalyzer and had been developed by his son and son's wife, with whom he co-founded the Gapminder Foundation.
The lectures made complex statistics on world developments understandable to the public, policy makers and opinion leaders. The lectures were broadcast via the Web and TV all over the world, and governments and organizations hired him as a lecturer and advisor.
Rosling devoted his professional life to global health, global health problems, and how these are related to poverty. With the conviction that reason and knowledge improve the world and that with it we can eradicate extreme poverty and reduce carbon emissions, Rosling pointed out that it is the richest billion of the world's population that must first and foremost reduce carbon emissions because they account for half of them.
Hans Rosling's memoirs How I Learnedto Understand the World, written with journalist Fanny Härgestam, were published posthumously in 2017 and Factfulness, written in collaboration with Ola and Anna Rosling Rönnlund, was published in 2018.
Agnes Geijer was born in October 1898 in an academic home in Uppsala. She later became a teacher of art and textile history at the School of Home Economics from 1921 to 1927 and an assistant professor at the National History Museum and the National Museum. She was also the leading researcher of her time in Nordic textile history.
She was head of Pieta's conservation department from 1930 to 1949 and head of the Swedish National Heritage Board's textile department.
In 1938, Geijer defended his thesis on ancient textiles from the excavations at Björkö (Birka) and made a pioneering contribution to textile research. The textiles found at Birka were made of different materials and produced differently, sometimes using unknown techniques. Geijer's work with the Birka finds showed that Viking Age costumes could be reconstructed and that their origin could be determined.
Agnes Geijer published several works, such as Medeltida textilier av svensk tillverkning, Textila skatter i Uppsala domkyrka and Ur textilkonstens historia, which have been translated into English, giving her international recognition.
To strengthen Nordic textile research, she established the Agnes Geijer Foundation for Nordic Textile Research, which has been active since 1988.
Agnes Geijer on the right at a preserved Polish flag from the 17th century belonging to the Swedish National Trophy Collection. Photo: The Swedish National Trophy Collection 1959.
Agnes Geijer on the right at Pietas textile conservation. Photo: From the Swedish Journal 1942.
In 1936, a sensational find was made that provided unique insight into the Middle Ages. In a bog near Varberg, the "Bockstensmannen" was found, who died around 1350. Agnes Geijer took part in the study of the Bockstensmannen's remains and his well-preserved clothes.
Otto von Friesen was born in Kulltorps parish, Jönköping county, and his most important scientific works deal with runic writing.
In 1897 von Friesen became an associate professor of Nordic languages at Uppsala University.
He published Om runskrifts härkomst (1906) and Rökstenen (1920), in which he claimed that the enigmatic stone is about a conflict between Ostrogoths and Frisian merchants.
During the years 1905-1936, von Friesen was a professor of Swedish language, became a member of the Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1928 and was elected to the Swedish Academy in 1929.
