Anthony Clifford Allison

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Anthony Clifford Allison
Born(1925-08-21)21 August 1925
CellCept
Spouses
Helen Green
​
(divorced)​
  • Elsie M. Eugui
ChildrenMiles and Joseph Mark
Scientific career
FieldsMedicine
Human genetics
InstitutionsRadcliffe Infirmary
University of Oxford
International Laboratory for Research on Animal Diseases
Syntex

Anthony Clifford Allison (21 August 1925 – 20 February 2014) was a

genetic resistance to malaria.[2] Clark completed his primary schooling in Kenya, completed his higher education in South Africa, and obtained a BSc in medical science from the University of the Witwatersrand in 1947. He earned his PhD from the University of Oxford in 1950.[1] After working at the Radcliffe Infirmary for two years, he worked as post-doctoral student to Linus Pauling in 1954. After teaching medicine for three years at Oxford, he worked at the Medical Research Council in London. In 1978 he simultaneously worked at the International Laboratory for Research on Animal Diseases (ILRAD) as its Director, and at the World Health Organization's (WHO) Immunology Laboratory, both in Nairobi. He later became the Vice President for Research at Syntex Corporation
(1981-1994).

While a graduate student at Oxford, Allison joined a vocational Oxford University Expedition to

resistant to the deadly falciparum malaria
.

In the 1970s, Allison had worked out the enzyme,

CellCept.[3]
He contributed more than 400 technical papers and edited 12 books.

Biography

Allison was born in East London, Eastern Cape, South Africa. His father was a

Hoffman LaRoche in 1994, he was given retirement. He continued to teach human genetics at Stanford University and participated in many therapeutic programmes at Alavita Pharmaceuticals.[6]

He spent his last 30 years at his home in Belmont, California. He died on 20 February 2014 as a result of complications of the end stage of pulmonary fibrosis, which he had been suffering from.[3][7] He was survived by his second wife, and two sons.[2]

Personal life

Allison developed an early interest in

extinct hominid Australopithecus africanus.[3] He was strongly influenced by Charles Darwin's books, On the Origin of Species and The Descent of Man, while still a teenager. As he put it, he "became a convinced Darwinian."[8]

Allison married Helen Green (7 February 1923 – 26 December 2011) while teaching at Oxford. After they had two sons, Miles and Joseph Mark, they soon divorced.[9] By then Allison met an Argentinian biochemist, Elsie Eugui, a visiting scientist in his laboratory at the Clinical Research Centre.[6] Allison found true partnership in profession as well as interest in Eugui, and married her. They were together for the rest of his life. They shared their passion in music, art, deep-sea fishing, hiking, bird-watching, and wine tasting.[2]

Achievements

Sickle-cell disease and resistance to malaria

In 1949 Allison participated in a vocational Oxford University Expedition to

resistance to Plasmodium falciparum. To test his hypothesis he had to wait four years until he completed his medical course. He returned to Nairobi in 1953 to start his experiments. He selected volunteers of the Luo people, who came from malaria hyperendemic area around Lake Victoria. Under experimental infection, volunteers indicated partial resistance to malaria. Then he found children naturally infected with malaria in Buganda. He discovered that children with heterozygous trait had significantly low number of parasites in their blood. This implies further that heterozygosity in children acquired better survival rate against malaria. His final results reported in 1954 from nearly 5,000 East Africans indicated the overall picture: sickle-cell trait confers resistance to malaria.[11][12][13][14]

When Allison introduced the genetic theory of malaria resistance, it was largely received with scepticism.[4][15] The reason was there were observations that malaria was equally found among homozygote and heterozygote patients in some East Africans.[16] Further it was experimentally demonstrated that malaria could be induced in African-Americans having heterozygous alleles.[17] But Allison argued that if selective pressure would operate children between six months and four years of age are most important for population study because survival is most critical to reach reproductive stage among these children. His arguments were proved right by subsequent studies among children of East, Central, and West Africa, showing 90% protection from malaria among children with heterozygous allele.[18][19][20][21]

CellCept

In the 1970s while working at the Medical Research Council, Allison had investigated the biochemical cause of immune deficiency in children. He discovered the metabolic pathway involving an enzyme,

US Food and Drug Administration on 3 May 1995,[32] and was commercialised under the brand name CellCept.[33][34]

Controversy

In 1982 Allison and Eugui reported in the Christmas issue of

University of Newcastle Medical School in New South Wales, who claimed that the scientific ideas were originally theirs, and accused Allison of stealing the idea.[36] Clark further stated that he had developed the concept back in the spring of 1982, and submitted his report to Nature, which rejected it because it was considered "out-of-purview" of the journal. Clark eventually published his work in the January issue of Infection and Immunity.[37] In August 1982, Clark had given Allison a draft copy of his manuscript; Allison's own experimental result was published in December. Reacting to the accusation, Allison explained that his experiment was independent of Clark's, and returned the accusation that while Clark was his student, he had claimed two works as his own, which were not. It was generally agreed that the original idea was that of Clark's.[38] A reconciliation paper was published in February 1983, jointly written by all the scientists involved.[39]

References

  1. ^ a b c Levens, R.G.C., ed. (1964). Merton College Register 1900-1964. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. p. 373.
  2. ^ a b c "Anthony Allison". Legacy.com. Retrieved 15 July 2014.
  3. ^
    S2CID 220107500
    .
  4. ^ a b c Spinney, Laura. "REDISCOVERING TONY ALLISON". Intelligent Life. The Economist Newspaper Limited. Archived from the original on 18 July 2014. Retrieved 15 July 2014.
  5. PMID 13042200
    .
  6. ^
    S2CID 54281245
    .
  7. ^ Sollinger, Hans W. "Obituary Anthony (Tony) Allison" (PDF). crippenandflynnchapels.com. Archived from the original (PDF) on 29 July 2014. Retrieved 22 July 2014.
  8. ^
    doi:10.1002/bmb.2002.494030050108
    .
  9. ^ Emma (4 January 2012). "Helen Green Allison, MA Oxon, MA John Hopkins, MBE: A founding mother or father of The National Autistic Culture". Autism Society of Kent County. Archived from the original on 9 August 2014. Retrieved 20 July 2014.
  10. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-7-6-769
    .
  11. PMID 13187561
    .
  12. PMID 13115700
    .
  13. S2CID 10056569
    .
  14. JSTOR 2844008
    .
  15. PMID 13404460
    .
  16. PMID 13260675
    .
  17. PMID 14363831
    .
  18. PMID 13304395
    .
  19. PMID 13187561
    .
  20. PMID 13279283
    .
  21. PMID 1092922
    .
  22. PMID 10878284
    .
  23. S2CID 34520788
    .
  24. PMID 1967654
    .
  25. S2CID 9028169
    .
  26. PMID 8680053
    .
  27. S2CID 26433174
    .
  28. S2CID 711727
    .
  29. S2CID 222199749
    .
  30. PMID 8475537
    .
  31. PMID 7947873
    .
  32. ^ "Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) Under Review for CellCept and Myfortic". U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Retrieved 23 July 2014.
  33. ^ Donlon, Diane M (15 June 1995). "New Agent to Prevent Kidney Transplant Rejection Now Available". Stanford University. Retrieved 23 July 2014.
  34. ^ "CellCept registry data demonstrated superior long-term organ transplant outcomes". Roche.com. F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. Archived from the original on 26 July 2014. Retrieved 23 July 2014.
  35. S2CID 20667129
    .
  36. S2CID 42696260
    .
  37. PMID 6822409
    .
  38. PMID 11655505
    .
  39. S2CID 38577381
    .
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