Eduard Arning

Eduard Arning (June 9, 1855 - 1936) was an English-German dermatologist and microbiologist from Manchester. In 1879 he obtained his medical doctorate from Strassburg, and afterwards was a medical assistant in Strassburg under Adolf Kussmaul (1822-1902), and in Berlin under Oskar Lassar (1849-1907). From 1884-86 he researched leprosy in the Hawaiian Islands. In 1887 he became a specialist of dermatology and venereal disease in Hamburg. In 1919 he became a professor of dermatology at the University of Hamburg.

Arning is known today for his medical studies done at the leper colony on Molokai. In 1884 he arrived in Hawaii under the sponsorship of King Kalakaua. He is remembered for his experiments involving contagiousness of leprosy. He did experiments on Hawaian natives, infecting them with lepra and then studying the course of disease. Today at the Hawaiian Historical Society Library in Honolulu are reproductions of 237 rare glass-plate photographs that Arning created during his stay in Hawaii. The original photos are in the Hamburgisches Museum für Völkerkunde in Hamburg.