Biographical entry
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Bright Sparcs
Biographical entry
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Simmons, Roy Thomas (1906 - 1975) |
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| Biochemist | ||
| Born: 29 April 1906 Heidelberg, Victoria, Australia. Died: 28 February 1975 East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. | ||
| Roy Thomas Simmons was Consultant Serologist (Prinicipal Scientific Officer) at the Commonwealth Serum Laboratory (CSL) in Victoria from 1961 to 1971. He started there as a temporary laboratory assistant in 1924. From 1927 to 1935 Simmons was seconded to the Commonwealth Department of Health as a relieving biochemist. While at CSL he worked mainly on blood groups and the Rh factor. His work made an outstanding contribution to the safety of blood transfusion in Australia, and the detection and understanding of Rh sensitisation, especially in relation to haemolytic disease of the newborn. He also used blood groups for anthropological studies, including collaborating with D. Carleton Gajdusek in 1955 on studies of a central nervous system disorder of the Fore people of New Guinea. Gajdusek concluded that it was transmitted by the ritualistic eating of the brains of deceased tribal members. |
Career Highlights | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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After graduating from the Junior School of the Working Men’s College (1923circa), Roy Thomas Simmons enrolled in a Diploma of Chemistry. He graduated in 1926 and became an Associate of the Working Men’s College in Inorganic Chemistry. While undertaking his studies, Simmons began working as a temporary laboratory assistant at the Commonwealth Serum Laboratory (CSL) in 1924. He remained with CSL until his retirement in 1971. By 1927 he had increased his knowledge of biochemistry and bacteriology to such an extent that he was seconded to the Commonwealth Department of Health as a relieving biochemist controlling diagnostic procedures throughout Australia. Simmons returned to the CSL in 1936 to help establish a Research Department there in which he was appointed personal assistant and biochemist to the Director of Research. Simmons became the first person in the world to isolate bacteriophages against diphtheria microbes, thus instigating work on the first vaccine. He also worked on other illnesses such as whooping cough, but by the early1940s his main interest was in blood groups. Roy Simmons was the first in Australia to discover the significance of the Rh factor and introduced the exchange blood transfusion technique to fight haemolytic disease in the newborn. From 1943 to 1971 Roy Simmons headed the free, nationwide blood group reference service of CSL. This work was invaluable to hospitals in screening patients and trying to find compatible blood donors. The blood group laboratory produced work of such high quality that in 1965 the World Health Organisation chose it to be the testing laboratory of the entire South-Pacific region. Overall the work of Roy Thomas Simmons and his collaborators helped dispel many myths and produce new vaccines and treatment regimes. One of his greatest contributions was the Anti-Rh agent which has helped prevent many deaths of Rh-positive babies carried by Rh-negative mothers (the mother’s immune system sees the baby’s Rh+ blood as foreign and a danger so initiates an immune reaction to kill of the perceived ‘threat’). Chronology
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Published by The University of Melbourne eScholarship Research Centre on ASAPWeb, 1994 - 2007 Originally published 1994-1999 by Australian Science Archives Project, 1999-2006 by the Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre Disclaimer, Copyright and Privacy Policy Submit any comments, questions, corrections and additions Prepared by: Acknowledgements Updated: 26 February 2007 http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/biogs/P003952b.htm |