Joshua_Harold_Burn

Joshua Harold Burn
Joshua Harold Burn FRS[1] (6 March 1892 – 13 July

1981) was an English pharmacologist and professor of Joshua Harold Burn
pharmacology at Oxford University.[2]
Burn worked on the internal control of the body by the

autonomic nervous system, carrying out seminal work
on the release of noradrenaline from these nerves and
introducing the controversial Burn-Rand hypothesis.[3]
The Nobel Laureate John Vane claimed "If anyone can

be said to have moulded the subject of pharmacology
around the world, it is he".[4]
Life
Burn in 1937
Burn was born in Barnard Castle, County Durham,
England.[5] He was educated at Barnard Castle Born 6 March 1892
School.[5] Burn entered Emmanuel College, Barnard Castle, England
Cambridge in 1909 where he read the Natural Sciences Died 13 July 1981 (aged 89)
[5]
Tripos. He specialised in physiology for Part II. [6]
Awards Fellow of the Royal Society[1]
His tutor was Frederick Gowland Hopkins. After
Scientific career
receiving his BA he was awarded a research grant by
Emmanuel College and a Michael Foster Studentship Fields Pharmacology
by the university. The next 18 months were spent in
research with Joseph Barcroft.[7] Other figures in physiology at Cambridge at the time were Keith Lucas
and the Nobel Laureates Archibald Hill and Edgar Adrian. In January 1914 Burn went to work for Henry
Hallett Dale in London.
In October 1914, Burn enlisted in the army as a Signals Officer with the rank of corporal. By the end of
1917 he was required to return to England to finish his medical training. From 1920 to 1926 he worked
with Henry Dale at the National Institute for Medical Research in Hampstead. His work involved the
standardisation of medicines. In 1925 he was appointed director of the Pharmacological Laboratories at
the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, again involved in the standardisation of medicines.[8]
Between 1926 and 1937 Burn had 44 co-workers, of which 30 came from overseas.[9] From 1933 he
worked closely with Edith Bülbring who was an exile from Nazi Germany.[9] In 1931 he was a founder
member of the British Pharmacological Society and he was a member of the commission that produced
the reforming British Pharmacopoeia in 1932.[9] In 1933 he was appointed Dean of The School of
Pharmacy, University of London.
From 1937 to 1959 Burn held the chair of Pharmacology at the
University of Oxford.[10] Over the years he had 162 academic
staff, including John Robert Vane (1927–2004), one of three
winners of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1982.
Burn also recruited chemist Harry Raymond Ing FRS (1899-1974)
in 1939 and pharmacologist Hugh Blaschko FRS (1900-1993) in
1944 who was a Jewish exile from Nazi Germany.[11][12]
Burn was an honorary Doctor of Yale University, the University of

Mainz and the University of Bradford. He was an honorary
member of the British Pharmacological Society, the German
Pharmacological Society and the Czechoslovakian Medical
Society of Jan Evangelista Purkyně and a member of the
Leopoldina and a Fellow of the Royal Society (elected 1942) .[1]
JH Burn punting WS Feldberg in In 1967 he received the Schmiedeberg-badge of the German
Cambridge in 1936 (British
Pharmacological Society and was the first recipient of the
Pharmacological Society meeting).
Wellcome Gold Medal of the British Pharmacological Society in
1979.[13]
Publications
Methods of Biological Assay, 1928; Recent Advances in Materia Medica, 1931; Biological
Standardization, 1937; Background of Therapeutics, 1948; Lecture Notes on Pharmacology, 1948;
Practical Pharmacology, 1952; Functions of Autonomic Transmitters, 1956; The Principles of
Therapeutics, 1957; Drugs, Medicines and Man, 1962; The Autonomic Nervous System, 1963; Our most
interesting Diseases, 1964; A Defence of John Balliol, 1970
References
1. Bulbring, E.; Walker, J. M. (1984). "Joshua Harold Burn. 6 March 1892 – 13 July 1981".
Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society. 30: 45–89.
doi:10.1098/rsbm.1984.0002 (https://doi.org/10.1098%2Frsbm.1984.0002). JSTOR 769820
(https://www.jstor.org/stable/769820). PMID 11616006 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/116
16006). S2CID 32218225 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:32218225).
2. "BURN, Joshua Harold", Who Was Who, A & C Black, 1920–2008; online edn, Oxford
University Press, Dec 2007 accessed 21 March 2012 (http://www.ukwhoswho.com/view/arti
cle/oupww/whowaswho/U162523)
3. "Joshua Harold Burn - British Pharmacological Society" (https://web.archive.org/web/20131
029191912/http://www.bps.ac.uk/details/resourcesPage/4972511/JH_Burn_.html?cat=bps1
3f9aa5e4a4). Archived from the original (http://www.bps.ac.uk/details/resourcesPage/49725
11/JH_Burn_.html?cat%3Dbps13f9aa5e4a4) on 29 October 2013. Retrieved 24 October
2013.
4. Physiology or medicine: 1981–1990, Volume 6 By Tore Frängsmyr, Jan E. Lindsten, p142
5. Joshua Harold Burn. 6 March 1892 – 13 July 1981 Edith Bülbring and J. M. Walker Page 47
of 44–89
6. "Archived copy" (https://web.archive.org/web/20131029203036/http://archiveshub.ac.uk/dat
a/gb483-burn). Archived from the original (http://archiveshub.ac.uk/data/gb483-burn) on 29
October 2013. Retrieved 24 October 2013.
of 44–89
8. "Prof. J. H. Burn" (https://www.nature.com/articles/140227b0). Nature. 140 (3536): 227. 1
August 1937. Bibcode:1937Natur.140R.227. (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1937Natur.1
40R.227.). doi:10.1038/140227b0 (https://doi.org/10.1038%2F140227b0). ISSN 1476-4687
(https://search.worldcat.org/issn/1476-4687).
of 44–89
of 44–89
11. Schild, Heinz Otto; Rose, Francis Leslie (November 1976). "Harry Raymond Ing, 31 July -
23 September 1974" (https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbm.1976.0010).
Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society. 22: 239–255.
doi:10.1098/rsbm.1976.0010 (https://doi.org/10.1098%2Frsbm.1976.0010). ISSN 0080-
4606 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/0080-4606).
12. Born, Gustav Victor Rudolf; Banks, P. (November 1996). "Hugh Blaschko, 4 January 1900 -
18 April 1993" (https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsbm.1996.0004). Biographical
Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society. 42: 40–60. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1996.0004 (https://do
i.org/10.1098%2Frsbm.1996.0004). ISSN 0080-4606 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/0080-
4606).
13. Rubin, Ronald P (February 2019). "Joshua Harold Burn (1892–1981): A visionary during the
evolution of pharmacology as a biomedical discipline" (http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1
177/0967772016685908). Journal of Medical Biography. 27 (1): 61–65.
doi:10.1177/0967772016685908 (https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0967772016685908).
ISSN 0967-7720 (https://search.worldcat.org/issn/0967-7720). PMID 30556478 (https://pub
med.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30556478).
External links
[1] (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2071473/pdf/brjpharm00633-0006.pdf)
[2] (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1915836/pdf/brjpharm00076-0007.pdf)
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Joshua Harold Burn

Joshua Harold Burn FRS[1] (6 March 1892 – 13 July

Burn worked on the internal control of the body by the

The Nobel Laureate John Vane claimed "If anyone can

Burn was an honorary Doctor of Yale University, the University of

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Joshua_Harold_Burn&oldid=1244976021"

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