Allvar Gullstrand

On July 28, 1930, Gullstrand passed away in Stockholm following a cerebral haemorrhage. He was buried in the ‘Norra begravningsplatsen’, which is the ‘Northern Cemetery’ in Solna Municipality, Stockholm.

He was born on June 5, 1862, in Landskrona, Sweden, to Dr. Pehr Alfred Gullstrand and Sofia Mathilda née Korsell. His father was the principal municipal medical officer.

He studied at schools in Landskrona and Jönköping and completed his matriculation in 1880.

Thereafter he moved to Uppsala and got enrolled at the ‘Uppsala University’, the oldest university of the country. He attended the university till 1885 following which he decided to move to Vienna to study otoscopy, ophthalmoscopy and laryngoscopy and studied there for a year.

He then moved to Stockholm and continued with his medical studies graduating from there in the subject in 1888.

In the pursuit of specialising in ophthalmology, he joined the ophthalmology clinic at Stockholm’s ‘Seraphim Hospital’ and started working as an assistant to Johan Widmark.

In 1891 he was inducted by the ‘Karolinska Institutet’ in Stockholm as Lecturer in Opthalmology. Simultaneously he also worked with ‘Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare’ (‘ Medicinalstyrelsen’) as a junior administrator, practiced privately and also worked in a public outpatient department (OPD).

In 1894, Gullstrand was delegated to the first chair and professor of ophthalmology at the prestigious ‘Uppsala University’, where he was once a student. The fact that he was appointed by this prestigious university even though he did not have to apply for the position was in itself a great honour.

He remained member of many international societies including the ‘German Ophthalmological Society’ in Heidelberg. In 1897 he entered the society and regularly attended their meetings and later in 1912 became a member of the ‘Board of Directors’ of the society. The ‘Graefe Medal’, which is awarded by the society every tenth year, was given to him in 1927.

Three works of Gullstrand contained complete proof of the theory he developed in his thesis on ‘Bidrag till astigmatismens teori’. These are ‘Allgemeine Theorie der monochromatischen Aberrationen und ihre nächsten Ergebnisse für die Ophthalmologie’ in 1900 (awards received from ’Swedish Medical Association’ and ‘Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences’); ‘Die reelle optische Abbildung’ in 1906; and ‘Die optische Abbildung in heterogenen Medien und die Dioptrik der Kristallinse des Menschen’ in 1908 (awarded ‘Centenary Gold Medal’ from ‘Swedish Medical Association’).

In 1904 he was elected as a member of the ‘The Royal Society at Uppsala’ and during 1913-1914 he remained its President.

His significant contributions include analysis and study of optical images and the way by which eye refracts light; his research on astigmatism; the detailed knowledge regarding structure and function of the transparent frontal portion of the eye called cornea; and improvement of corrective lenses used after cataract surgery.

Through his measurements known as the 'optical constants' of the eye, which are very much relevant and used till now, he explained a mathematical model of the human eye that is the 'schematic eye'.