Invisible Landscapes

Scientists’ recent discovery of a “new” part of the human body, the interstitium, is an invitation to think differently about our relationship with the world at large

This essay is a companion piece to an episode of Radiolab, titled The Interstitium. You don’t need to have heard it for this essay to make sense, but listening to it will no doubt enrich your understanding.

In 2018, scientists discovered a new organ (?) in the human body. You’d think after centuries of cutting ourselves open, we’d know the intimate details of the structures within us by now. Strangely, this body part wasn’t missed because it was invisible; it was overlooked because of what our belief systems wouldn’t let us perceive.

Until quite recently, if doctors wanted to study human tissue from a living person, they had to remove it first. Then they’d essentially mummify it: drying, freezing, slicing, and fixing it on a slide so they could peer at its shriveled dead form under a microscope to ascertain what was happening at a cellular level. As a result, scientists and doctors were taught in medical school that collagen tissue is essentially a dense wall: a barrier.