Nova Scotian Institute of Science - Hall of Fame
- Oswald Theodore Avery
- Born: 21 October 1877, Halifax, Nova Scotia
- Died: 20 February 1955, Nashville, Kentucky, USA
- Field: Molecular Biology, Bacteriology, and Immunochemistry
- Focus: Discovery in 1944 with his co-worker Maclyn McCarty that DNA is the material of which genes and chromosomes are made
Oswald Avery was born in Halifax, son of Rev. Joseph and Elizabeth Avery; his father came to Halifax from England. Avery moved with his parents to New York in 1887 and was educated at Colgate (A.B., 1900) and at Columbia (M.D., 1904). He carried on medical research at the Hoagland Laboratory in Brooklyn from 1906 to 1913, and then joined the Rockefeller Institute Hospital as a bacteriologist. Avery remained with the Institute until 1955, and died in Nashville that year. His research on pneumococcus made him world renowned. The Royal Society of London awarded him the Copley Medal in 1945, and the Association of American Physicians awarded him the Kober Medal in 1947. Avery was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1933, and became a Fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1944. He is regarded as one of the founders of Immunochemistry, and served as President of: The American Association of Immunologists in 1929; The American Association of Pathologists and Bacteriologists in 1934; and The Society of American Bacteriologists in 1941. He received honorary degrees from: Colgate (Sc.D., 1921), McGill (LL.D., 1935), New York University (Sc.D., 1947), Chicago (Sc.D., 1950), and Rutgers (Sc.D., 1954).
Related Links
Profiles in Science: The Oswald T. Avery Collection
Bibliography
Marble, Allan E.: Nova Scotians at Home and Abroad. Lancelot Press, Windsor, Nova Scotia, 1977.