Foà, Piero P. (Piero Pio), 1911-

Biography

Piero Foà

Piero Pio Foà was born in Turin, Italy, on April 13, 1911. Prior to his birth, his father, Carlo, who had been a student of Angelo Mosso, recorded and published the world's first fetal electrocardiogram (that of Piero Foà).

Piero Foà obtained his M.D. degree from the University of Milan in 1934, and served his internship (1936-1937) and residency at the University of Milan Hospital. He obtained a Ph.D. in chemistry in 1938, and was an assistant professor of physiology at the University of Pavia when he left Fascist Italy for the United States in 1939 with the help of an immigration visa obtained through the good offices of such luminaries as pioneering neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing and physiologist Walter B. Cannon.

Dr. Foà's first position in the United States was as a research fellow in the department of physiology at Yale University. Settling in Michigan, Dr. Foà held a research fellowship in surgery at the University of Michigan (1939-1942). At the Chicago Medical School, he held a fellowship in medicine (1942-1943) and later was an assistant professor of physiology and pharmacology (1944-1945). The primary locus of Dr. Foà's career was Wayne State University, where he spent some forty years, first as chief of the endocrine and metabolic clinic (1944-1947) and as an associate professor (1946-1951), later as a full professor (1961-1983) in the Department of Physiology. He was also for many years the chairman of the Department of Research at Detroit's Sinai Hospital. Dr. Foà's current title is emeritus professor of physiology at Wayne State University.

Angelo Mosso

Born in Turin, Italy in 1846, Mosso received an M.D. from the University of Turin in 1870. He did further work at Florence and Leipzig. Returning to Turin, he became professor of pharmacology (1875) and professor of physiology (1879). Under him, Turin became an extremely active center for research in experimental physiology and biology. He pursued two main lines of research: the analysis of motor functions and the relationship between physiological and psychic phenomena. He perfected the plethysmograph, which measured slow changes in the volume of the blood vessels. When bad health forced him to give up his physiological studies in 1904, Mosso devoted his energies to archaeological research. He acquired as great fame in archaeology as he had in physiology, conducting studies in the Roman Forum, Crete and Southern Italy. Angelo Mosso died in Turin in 1910.

From the guide to the Materials re: Angelo Mosso, 1906-1907, 1910, 1937, 1981-1983, (University of California, San Francisco. Library. Archives and Special Collections.)