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Jose Manuel Rodriguez Delgado

Article in Neuropsychopharmacology · December 2012

DOI: 10.1038/npp.2012.160 · Source: PubMed

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 Neuropsychopharmacology (2012) 37, 2883–2884
& 2012 American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. All rights reserved 0893-133X/12
www.neuropsychopharmacology.org

Obituary
Jose Manuel Rodriguez Delgado
Neuropsychopharmacology (2012) 37, 2883–2884; these results, and Moniz example, Delgado extended his
doi:10.1038/npp.2012.160 research to patients with chronic refractory epilepsy and
schizophrenia.
This ground breaking research was published in 1952
anticipating similar work by Bob Heath at the Tulane
University. 1952 was a watershed year in neuroscience, when
chlorpromazine was being given to patients with schizo-
phrenia, spawning the neuropsychopharmacology revolution.
Delgado positioned himself between growing disapproval
of mutilating brain surgery and his own belief that electrical
stimulation of specific brain areas was scientifically superior
to oral administration of drugs whose effects were mitigated
by liver metabolism, the blood–brain barrier, and uncertain
distribution.
Events proved Jose wrong; the effects of electrical
stimulation were imprecise, poorly replicated and yielded
no useful therapeutic outcomes. Conversely, neuropsycho-
pharmacology thrived. Drugs were developed for every type
of psychiatric disorder, deinstitutionalization occurred,
and, in 1970, the Nobel Prize went to Julius Axelrod and
Jose Delgado was born in Ronda Spain in 1915, a founding colleagues for the catecholamine hypothesis of depression.
member of the ACNP and lifelong Fellow. He died at age 96, Nevertheless, in two decades (1950–1970) Delgado
3 months before our organization celebrated its fiftieth authored 134 scientific publications on electrical stimula-
anniversary. tion in cats, monkeys and patients, both psychotic and non-
Jose intended to emulate his father, an ophthalmologist, psychotic. In 1963, he performed an experiment that
but fell under the spell of Santiago Ramon y Cahal often attracted worldwide attention, including a front page article
considered the ‘Father of Neuroscience’, Nobel Laureate in in the New York Times. After implanting his stimoceiver in
1906. the caudate nucleus of a fighting bull, Jose stood facing the
Jose enrolled in Madrid Medical School in 1933 to study bull waving a red cape before stopping the animal in its
both medicine and physiology. In 1936, the Spanish civil tracks by activating the electrodes.
war erupted, his mentor Juan Negri fled the country and Soon after this, Delgado was invited to contribute a
Jose joined the Republican side as a medical corpsman. volume to a series on ‘World Perspectives’. Its editorial
After the fascist victory he spent 5 months in a concentra- board comprised 12 of the world’s most distinguished
tion camp before obtaining his MD and Doctorate of leaders in ethics, sociology, economics, spirituality, and
Science, both cum laude. science, including three Nobel Laureates. The series editor
From 1942 to 1950, he began research in neurophysiology was a renowned philosopher whose life was devoted to
on selective brain ablation and electrical stimulation in inviting leading scientists and thinkers to speculate on the
animals, published 14 articles and won several prizes. In his societal and philosophical implications of their narrow
2005 OHP interview, at age 90, he tells how he went to Africa fields; to ‘extrapolate an idea in relation to life’.
to buy primates for research, bonded with a gorilla and, Jose chose a provocative title for his volume, ‘Physical
unable to operate on his ‘new friend’, donated the animal to Control of the Mind: Towards a Psychocivilized Society’.
a zoo. The text and tone were equally challenging. Although
In 1950, Delgado won a scholarship to the Yale University Jose’s discussion of his scientific findings was modest and
in the Department of Physiology under the direction of John objective, the philosophical speculations were grandiose
Fulton whose pioneer work on pre-frontal lobotomy in and went beyond the data. None the less his intent was
chimpanzees encouraged the Portuguese psychiatrist Egas benevolent; to encourage the development of ‘a future
Moniz to perform the operation in schizophrenic patients, psychocivilized human being; a less cruel, happier, and
for which he received the Noble Prize in 1949. better man’. In essence, he was proposing that science might
Delgado flourished at Yale; rising to Professor of both accomplish what two millennia of religion failed to do!
Physiology and Psychiatry, he eventually succeeded Fulton Unfortunately, this rhetoric and hyperbole clashed with a
as Director of Research. Described as ‘a technological changing scientific, political, and social Zeitgeist, engulfing
wizard’, he invented the ‘stimoceiver’; implanted electrodes Delgado in controversy that would end his career in
that established two-way communications with the brain in America. Without distinguishing between science and
mobile animals allowing Jose to stimulate different regions, philosophy, Jose’s research and ideas were attacked and
producing changes in affect and behavior. Encouraged by denigrated on two fronts.
 Obituary
2884
In 1972, Congress held hearings in response to efforts to For the next quarter century, Jose continued to publish
end funding for this type of brain surgery. Testimony was his research and philosophical ideas, achieving a lifetime
given by a libertarian psychiatrist, a scientologist at the total of over 500 articles and six books. His final book,
time, who disparaged drugs, ECT, and biological psychiatry. in 1989, was titled ‘Happiness’ and went through 14
This included a collage of selective, out of context, editions.
quotations from Delgado and other neuropsychiatrists. In the last years of his life, Jose and his wife returned to
Coincidentally, public and political outrage surfaced over America and lived in San Diego where he died unheralded.
covert CIA ‘mind control’ experiments, designed to combat Unjustly treated and harshly judged by segments of the
communism, initiated in the McCarthy era and extending public and his profession, Jose Delgado’s ground breaking
into the mid 1960s (MK-ULTRA). research, benevolent philosophy, and memory deserve
These twin forces manifested a plethora of websites fed by better recognition. His career trajectory may provide
conspiracy theorists and alleged victims of psychosurgery that budding scientists with a cautionary note about the pitfalls
disseminated innuendo and largely unsubstantiated accusa- of mingling science with philosophy.
tions for four decades. Delgado’s name and book figure pro-
minently along with other well-known psychiatrists from among Barry Blackwell1
1
43 universities and colleges alleged to have been involved. Department of Psychiatry, Milwaukee Clinical Campus of
Mired in controversy, Delgado accepted an offer to the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine, Milwaukee,
become Chair of Physiological Science at a new medical WI, USA
school in Madrid and moved there in 1974. E-mail: [email protected]

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