IIAGENDIE, FBAs tors (1783 1855). An eminent French physiologist and physician, born at Bordeaux. Through the in fluence of his father, who practiced as a physi cian in Paris, he became a pupil of Boyer, the celebrated anatomist. At the age of twenty, after a competitive examination, he was appoint ed proseetor in the faculty of medicine, and soon afterwards a demonstrator. He was subsequently appointed physician to the Hatel-Dien. In 1819 he was elected a member of the Academy of Sci ences. and in 1831 succeeded Weamier in the chair of anatomy in the College of France.
He was the first to prove experimentally that the veins are organs of absorption; he gave a more accurate account of the process of vomiting than had been previously given; he pointed out that an animal cannot live solely on any one kind of food; he investigated the physiological action and therapeutic uses of hydrocyanic acid and strychnine; he performed an important series of experiments on the cause of death when air is admitted into the larger veins; he made numerous experiments to determine the functions of various nerves and of different parts of the brain; and, lastly, he shares with Sir Charles Bell the honor of having discovered the separate functions of the two roots of the spinal nerves.
Magendie's chief physiological works are: /Ws cis elementaire de physiologic (Paris. 1816). which went through several editions, and was en larged into the Elements de physiologie, which was translated into English. and was for many years the best work on physiology in this lan guage: Lecons sin- les phenomencs physiques de la He (Paris, 1836-42) ; Lecons sur le sang (Paris, 1839) ; Lecons sur les functions et les maladies du systeme nerrcux (Paris, 1839) ; and Recherches philosophigues et eli 'agues sur le liquids cephalo-raehidien on eere bro-spinal (Paris, 1842). Ile was likewise the founder and for ten years the editor of the Jour nal de la Physiologic Experimentalc.