For years, the appendix carried a reputation as the body’s most pointless organ. Doctors often removed it without hesitation, ...

Is there a more maligned human anatomic structure than the vermiform appendix? Since Charles Darwin, schoolchildren have learned to disparage it as a useless vestige of evolution with a tendency to ...

You’d think life was dangerous enough without our bodies lugging around a useless structure that can turn traitor and kill us. We’re talking, of course, about the appendix--that 4-inch-long blind ...

The vermiform appendix or appendix as we commonly know it, is a vestigial organ of the body which does not come into notice unless it is inflamed (such as in appendicitis). In cases of appendicitis, ...

IN this book Prof. Kenelm Digby discusses the functions which may be performed by such structures as the tonsils, the intestinal lymphoid follicles, and the vermiform appendix, all of which are ...

TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. About the Archive This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online ...

Since the dawn of modern medicine the vermiform appendix has seemed to be a completely useless organ. This week, the University of Chicago’s Dr. Leon 0. Jacobson suggested that a use for the appendix ...

If you enjoyed this article, I’d like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in ...

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Based on: The Vermiform Appendix and Its Diseases. By Howard A. Kelly, A.B., M.D., Professor of Gynecology in the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and E. Hurdon ...