David Tyrrell (physician)
David Tyrrell Ashford, Middlesex, England | |
---|---|
Died | 2 May 2005 Salisbury, England | (aged 79)
Nationality | British |
Alma mater | University of Sheffield |
Known for | Discovery and naming of coronaviruses |
Spouse |
Moyra Wylie (m. 1950) |
Children | 3 (1 son and 2 daughters) |
Scientific career | |
Institutions | Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research Medical Research Council, Sheffield Common Cold Unit Northwick Park Hospital |
Doctoral students | Wendy Barclay[1] |
David Arthur John Tyrrell
Biography
Tyrrell was born on 19 June 1925 to Sidney Tyrrell and Agnes Kate Blewett. He had a younger brother Andrew.[2] He attended elementary schools at Ashford, Middlesex. His family moved to Sheffield in 1940, where he completed secondary education at King Edward VII School. While studying medicine at the University of Sheffield he suffered from a detached retina, which meant he was exempted from military conscription, and had a lifelong preference for monocular microscopes.[3] He graduated in 1948 and earned membership of the Royal College of Physicians in 1949.[4] During those years he worked as a house physician at the Professorial Medical Unit of Sheffield Royal Hospital and at the City General Hospital in Sheffield. He was appointed as the first Research Registrar post under the Hospital Endowment Fund of Sheffield in 1950.[2]
He moved to the
In the 1960s, after June Almeida produced the first images of the rubella virus using immune-electronmicroscopy,[6] Tyrrell and Almeida worked on characterising a new type of viruses, now called coronaviruses.[7]
He retired from the Common Cold Unit in 1990[8] and subsequently carried out research at the Centre for Applied Microbiology and Research at Porton Down, where he also worked on his scientific autobiography, Cold Wars: The Fight Against the Common Cold.[2] He died of prostate cancer on 2 May 2005 at Salisbury.[4]
Personal life
Tyrrell married Moyra Wylie,[9] a general practitioner, in 1950.[3] They had one son and two daughters. He was a devoted Christian and served as an organist and choirmaster at his local church.[4]
Scientific achievements
Soon after he joined CCU, Tyrrell developed a system of categorising cold viruses. Some viruses could be maintained only in human-embryo-kidney cell culture and were designated H strain, and others could be maintained both in human-embryo-kidney cell culture and monkey-embryo-kidney cell culture and were labelled M strain.[10][11] One nasal swab sample collected on 17 February 1961 from a schoolboy in Epsom, Surrey, was different as it could not be maintained in any of the culture media. The specimen designated B814 when experimented on healthy volunteers was highly contagious and produced the symptoms of cold within a few days.[12] Due to its unusual nature, they were uncertain whether the pathogen was a virus or a bacterium. Without any other method to study, the specimen was preserved for four years. Returning from a visit to the Lund University in Sweden in 1965, Andrewes told Tyrrell that there was a young Swedish surgeon who was able to grow complex viruses. The Swede was Bertil Hoorn who had developed a culture method using human trachea tissue.[13] Tyrrell immediately invited Hoorn to visit CCU, and after which they were able to grow different viruses which could not be cultured earlier.[14] Specimen B814 could then be confirmed as a virus, but was unique from all known cold viruses based on its antigenic property and symptoms it produced.
Tyrrell and Malcolm L. Bynoe reported the discovery in the 5 June 1965 issue of the
The new discovery was supported by independent discovery of new human viruses (
We looked more closely at the appearance of the new viruses and noticed that they had a kind of halo surrounding them. Recourse to a dictionary produced the Latin equivalent, corona, and so the name coronavirus was born.[21]
Other works
At the Rockefeller Institute, Tyrrell worked on the epidemiology on
Awards and honours
Tyrrell was elected a
References
- EThOS uk.bl.ethos.383380. Archived from the originalon 28 January 2018. Retrieved 28 January 2018.
- ^ S2CID 73300843.
- ^ a b c d Taylor-Robinson, David (30 May 2005). "Dr David Tyrrell". The Independent. Retrieved 29 August 2020.
- ^ PMC 558394.
- .
- ISBN 9781786294357.
- ISBN 978-1-55581-507-3.
- Wikidata Q29581528.
- S2CID 43188254.
- PMID 13778900.
- PMID 13923371.
- PMID 14455113.
- PMID 14146666.
- PMID 14286939.
- PMID 14288084.
- PMID 14012223.
- PMID 14077994.
- S2CID 1314901.
- PMID 4293939.
- PMID 5231356.
- ISBN 978-0-19-263285-2.
- PMID 14881586.
- PMID 13840112.
- PMID 14402042.
- PMID 13840115.
- PMID 2993431.
- PMID 3033026.
External links
David Tyrrell on the History of Modern Biomedicine Research Group website