Percy Wragg Brian FRS

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and Literature, letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". ...

CBE (5 September 1910 – 17 August 1979) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

botanist and mycologist. He was critical to the development of plant pathology and natural antibiotics such as

Gibberellin Gibberellins (GAs) are plant hormones that regulate various Biological process, developmental processes, including Plant stem, stem elongation, germination, dormancy, flowering, flower development, and leaf and fruit senescence. They are one of th ...

and Griseofulvin.

Life

He was born in Hall Green, Yardley to Percy Brian (1881–1945), a schoolteacher from

Macclesfield Macclesfield () is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East, Cheshire, England. It is sited on the River Bollin and the edge of the Cheshire Plain, with Macclesfield Forest to its east; the town lies south of Ma ...

and his wife Adelaide Wragg. His early education was at

King Edward's School, Birmingham King Edward's School (KES) is an independent school (UK), independent day school for boys in the British Public school (UK), public school tradition, located in Edgbaston, Birmingham. Founded by Edward VI of England, King Edward VI in 1552, it ...

. He graduated from

King's College, Cambridge King's College, formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, is a List of colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college lies beside the River Cam and faces ...

in 1931. He was awarded a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in 1936 and

DSc DSC or Dsc may refer to: Education * Doctor of Science (D.Sc.) * District Selection Committee, an entrance exam in India * Doctor of Surgical Chiropody, superseded in the 1960s by Doctor of Podiatric Medicine Educational institutions * Dyal Sin ...

in 1951, and he was elected a Fellow of

Queens' College, Cambridge Queens' College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Queens' is one of the 16 "old colleges" of the university, and was founded in 1448 by Margaret of Anjou. Its buildings span the R ...

in 1968. His first employment was as Assistant Mycologist at

Long Ashton Research Station Long Ashton Research Station (LARS) was an agricultural and horticultural government-funded research centre located in the village of Long Ashton near Bristol, UK. It was created in 1903 to study and improve the West Country cider industry an ...

where he worked from 1934 to 1936. In 1936 he began at ICI's facility at Jealott's Hill before moving in the late 1930s to their Butterwick Research Laboratories (later renamed Akers) as Mycologist and in 1946 was promoted to Head of Microbiology. He served in this role for ICI until 1961 and spent his final two years with them as Associate Research Manager. During this period, in 1962, he was on a team which discovered new antibiotics produced by fungi. He was appointed to the Regius Chair of Botany at

University of Glasgow The University of Glasgow (abbreviated as ''Glas.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals; ) is a Public university, public research university in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded by papal bull in , it is the List of oldest universities in continuous ...

in 1962, leaving six years later to become Head of the Cambridge Botany School. He was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

in 1958. In 1964 he was made a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was establis ...

. He was President of the British Mycological Society in 1959 and 1965; President of the Association of Applied Biologists in 1961; and President of the Society of General Microbiology from 1965 to 1968.

Family

He married twice, firstly to Iris Hunt in 1934 (dissolved) secondly to Meg Gilling in 1948. His younger brother, Michael Vaughan Brian (1919–1990), was an entomologist, specialising in ants.

References

1910 births 1979 deaths Scientists from Birmingham, West Midlands Fellows of the Royal Society Alumni of King's College, Cambridge Fellows of Queens' College, Cambridge 20th-century British botanists Professors of Botany (Cambridge) Commanders_of_the_Order_of_the_British_Empire {{UK-botanist-stub