Rodney Robert Porter

From Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core
(Redirected from Professor Rodney Porter)
Jump to: navigation, search
Rodney Porter
Rodney Robert Porter.jpg
Born Rodney Robert Porter
(1917-10-08)8 October 1917
Newton-le-Willows, Lancashire
Died Script error: The function "death_date_and_age" does not exist.
Nationality English
Fields biochemistry
Institutions <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Alma mater <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>
Thesis The free amino groups of proteins (1948)
Doctoral advisor Frederick Sanger[1]
Known for Chemical structure of antibodies
Notable awards <templatestyles src="Plainlist/styles.css"/>

Rodney Robert Porter, CH, FRS[2] (8 October 1917 – 6 September 1985) was an English biochemist[3][4] and Nobel laureate.[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]

Education and early life

Born in Newton-le-Willows, St Helens, Lancashire, England, Rodney Robert Porter received his Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Liverpool in 1939 for Biochemistry. He moved to the University of Cambridge where he became Fred Sanger's first PhD student.[1] He was awarded his doctorate in 1948.[13][14]

Career and research

Porter worked for the National Institute for Medical Research for eleven years (1949–1960) before joining St. Mary's Hospital Medical School, Imperial College London and becoming the Pfizer Professor of Immunology. In 1967 he was appointed Whitley Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Oxford, and Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford. His colleague Elizabeth Press (Betty Press) worked with him at NIMR, St Mary's and at Oxford contributing extensively to the work which led to the Nobel Prize.

Awards and honours

Porter was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1964.[2] He won the Gairdner Foundation International Award in 1966.[citation needed] In 1972, Porter shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology with Gerald M. Edelman for determining the chemical structure of an antibody.[15][16][17][18][19] Using the enzyme papain, he broke the blood's immunoglobin into fragments, making them easier to study. He also looked into how the blood's immunoglobins react with cellular surfaces. He subsequently worked with colleagues Kenneth BM Reid, Robert Sim and Duncan Campbell on developing understanding of the Complement Proteins associated with defence against infection.

In 1991, Raymond Dwek founded the Oxford Glycobiology Institute at the Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford and this building was named after Porter as the Rodney Porter building.

Death

Porter died in a road accident near Winchester, Hampshire and is survived by his wife and five children.

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. Britannica Information on Rodney Porter
  14. Nobel Prize Biography of Rodney Porter
  15. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.