Martin Henry Dawson
Encyclopedia
Martin Henry Dawson was a Canadian-born researcher who made important contributions in the fields of infectious diseases.
Dawson was born in Truro, Nova Scotia
Truro, Nova Scotia
-Education:Truro has one high school, Cobequid Educational Centre. Post-secondary options include a campus of the Nova Scotia Community College, as well as the Nova Scotia Agricultural College in the neighboring town of Bible Hill.- Sports :...
,a grandson of John Barnhill Dickie
John Barnhill Dickie
John Barnhill Dickie was a farmer, teacher and political figure in Nova Scotia, Canada. He represented Colchester County in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly from 1874 to 1878 as an independent member....
and educated at Dalhousie University
Dalhousie University
Dalhousie University is a public research university located in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The university comprises eleven faculties including Schulich School of Law and Dalhousie University Faculty of Medicine. It also includes the faculties of architecture, planning and engineering located at...
and McGill University
McGill University
Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
. His research included studies on the transmutation of strains of pneumococci and on the biological variants of the streptococcus
Streptococcus
Streptococcus is a genus of spherical Gram-positive bacteria belonging to the phylum Firmicutes and the lactic acid bacteria group. Cellular division occurs along a single axis in these bacteria, and thus they grow in chains or pairs, hence the name — from Greek στρεπτος streptos, meaning...
and other microorganism
Microorganism
A microorganism or microbe is a microscopic organism that comprises either a single cell , cell clusters, or no cell at all...
s. Dawson's studies on the nature and treatment of arthritis
Arthritis
Arthritis is a form of joint disorder that involves inflammation of one or more joints....
made him a recognized authority in this disorder. He was a pioneer in penicillin
Penicillin
Penicillin is a group of antibiotics derived from Penicillium fungi. They include penicillin G, procaine penicillin, benzathine penicillin, and penicillin V....
therapy, and was the first in the world to prepare it and use it in human disease. This included the successful treatment of bacterial endocarditis
Endocarditis
Endocarditis is an inflammation of the inner layer of the heart, the endocardium. It usually involves the heart valves . Other structures that may be involved include the interventricular septum, the chordae tendineae, the mural endocardium, or even on intracardiac devices...
with penicillin, and the use of gold salts in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.
Dawson became the first person in history to stick a needle full of an antibiotic (penicillin) into a patient, on October 16, 1940.
Military career
After he had graduated Dalhousie University in Halifax with a BABachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
in 1916 he started serving in the Canadian forces in the First World War. Pte. M. Henry Dawson was with No. 7 Stationary Hospital at La Harve, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. He became a Capt. in the Nova Scotia Reg’t of Canadian Army Medical Corps. He was wounded in 1917 and again in 1918 and was awarded the Military Cross
Military Cross
The Military Cross is the third-level military decoration awarded to officers and other ranks of the British Armed Forces; and formerly also to officers of other Commonwealth countries....
in 1917.
Career as a researcher
Following the war Dawson attended McGill University in Quebec and received his M.D.Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
degree in 1923. After graduating in Medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
he worked at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
. In 1926 he was appointed a National Research Fellow
Fellow
A fellow in the broadest sense is someone who is an equal or a comrade. The term fellow is also used to describe a person, particularly by those in the upper social classes. It is most often used in an academic context: a fellow is often part of an elite group of learned people who are awarded...
, assigned to the Rockefeller Institute in New York.
As a National Research Council fellow he worked with Oswald Avery
Oswald Avery
Oswald Theodore Avery ForMemRS was a Canadian-born American physician and medical researcher. The major part of his career was spent at the Rockefeller University Hospital in New York City...
at the Rockefeller Institute. Over Avery's strong objections, Dawson recreated Fred Griffith's discovery that a soluble substance from dead bacteria of one type can effect a repeatable and inheritable change in bacteria of another type - a process Dawson termed transformation
Transformation (genetics)
In molecular biology transformation is the genetic alteration of a cell resulting from the direct uptake, incorporation and expression of exogenous genetic material from its surroundings and taken up through the cell membrane. Transformation occurs naturally in some species of bacteria, but it can...
in his six articles on the subject - in which he was the first person in history to put the substance to work in a test tube and even to partially extract it. The phrase stuck and eventually Avery along with Colin Munro MacLeod proved the substance was in fact DNA
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
.
In 1929 Dawson became associated with the Presbyterian Hospital and the Department of Medicine at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
.
In 1942 Dawson became the victim of myasthenia gravis
Myasthenia gravis
Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune neuromuscular disease leading to fluctuating muscle weakness and fatiguability...
, a chronic progressively disabling disease.
Career
- 1916 B.A. Dalhousie University
- 1923 M.D. McGill University
- 1923 C.M. McGill University
- 1923-1924 Demonstrator in Pathology and Bacteriology, McGill University. Externe in Pathology, Royal Victoria Hospital.
- 1924-1925 Instructor in Pathology and Bacteriology, University of Louisville.
- 1925-1926 Assistant Resident Physician, Royal Victoria Hospital.
- 1926-1928 National Research Council Fellow in Medicine. Rockefeller Institute.
- 1928-1929 Assistant, Rockefeller Institute.
- 1929-1930 Associate in Medicine, College of Physicians and Surgeons.
- 1929- Assistant Attending Physician, Presbyterian Hospital.
- 1930- Assistant Professor of Medicine, College of Physicians and Surgeons.