Nobel Laureate Barry Marshall experimented on himself to prove a scientific hypothesis. Here he goes in search of John Hunter, a zealous seventeenth century surgeon who similarly made himself into a guinea pig.

Marshall was certain that stomach ulcers were caused by bacterial infection, as opposed to stress or diet, but he needed to prove it against the weight of settled scientific opinion. Keeping his family in the dark, he drank a culture of bacteria to give himself stomach ulcers. It may have seemed madness but he managed to cure the ulcers he caused with antibiotics, proving they were a bacterial infection.

This may be extreme, but Marshall is impressed by the exploits of John Hunter. In order to prove his hunch of how gonorrhoea is contagious, John Hunter took the infected pus from a patient's penis and injected it into his own. He got gonorrhoea - proving it was contagious - but also syphilis, which probably caused his death. Marshall will explore Hunter's life, and asks whether even he could be that dedicated to scientific discovery.

Producer: Lucy Adam. Show less