World of Scientific Discovery on Almroth Edward Wright
One of the founders of immunology, Almroth Wright was born in the village of Middleton Tyas, in Yorkshire, England. His mother, Ebba Almroth, was the daughter of a Swedish chemistry professor, and his father was an Irish Presbyterian minister. Wright grew up at his father's clerical posts in Dresden, Germany; Boulogne, France; and Belfast, Ireland. He was educated chiefly by his parents and tutors. He entered Trinity College, Dublin, in 1878, earning his bachelors of arts in modern literature in 1882 and his bachelors of medicine in 1883. He then studied at the universities of Leipzig, Marburg, and Strasbourg. From 1889 to 1891, Wright taught physiology at Sydney University in Australia, then returned to England.
In 1892, Wright received an appointment as professor of pathology at the Army Medical School in Netley, Hampshire, a position he held for ten years. At Netley, Wright conducted original research in blood coagulation and bacteriology. In 1896, he developed a vaccine against typhoid fever using dead typhoid bacilli. The vaccine was tested on soldiers in the Indian Army. It was found to be effective and used on British troops in the Boer War. By the time World War I began, most British troops had been vaccinated against typhoid fever.
Wright was knighted in 1906 in recognition of his work on typhoid. Differences with the army caused Wright to resign in 1902. He then became professor of pathology at St. Mary's Hospital, London. At St. Mary's, Wright directed the inoculation department and headed a very talented research staff that included Alexander Fleming. Wright was highly respected by his staff for his contagious enthusiasm and, after long days in the laboratory, he often gathered with his colleagues for late-night discussions over tea. In 1911, Wright traveled to South Africa to initiate prophylactic (protective) inoculation against pneumonia among Africans working in the Rand gold mines. During World War I, Wright and his research team served in France, studying wound treatment. He developed the use of salt solution to draw lymph into wounds, hastening healing. Wright returned to St. Mary's in 1919 and there continued his work on immunology until his retirement in 1946. He died at home in Farnham Common, Buckinghamshire, in 1947.
Wright's many innovations have earned him a place beside Paul Ehrlich, Louis Pasteur, and Elie Metchnikoff as a founder of modern immunology. In addition to his inoculations against typhoid fever and pneumonia, Wright developed a vaccine against certain forms of tuberculosis. He established inoculation therapy, the technique of treating, rather than preventing, microbial diseases by vaccination. He reconciled the early dispute about whether immune responses were caused by antibodies (substances in the blood) or by phagocytes (bacteria-killing cells), finding that certain blood factors called opsonins helped the phagocytes to destroy bacteria. However, the brash manner in which Wright expressed his unconventional views injured his reputation; he was, for example, a staunch anti-feminist and took part in a bitter public dispute on the subject with George Bernard Shaw.
This is the complete article, containing 490 words
(approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page).
