Mary Jessie MacDonald Noble

ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...

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". ...

FIB (23 February 1911 – 20 July 2002) was a seed pathologist for the Department of Agriculture for Scotland and was key in producing the ''Handbook of Seed-borne Diseases''.

Life

She was born in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

the daughter of John Noble a pharmacist on Gladstone Place on

Leith Links Leith Links is the principal open space within Leith, the docks district of Edinburgh, Scotland. This public park is divided by a road into two main areas, a western section and an eastern section, both being largely flat expanses of grass bor ...

. The family lived at 37 Willowbrae Road. She was educated privately at the

Mary Erskine School The Mary Erskine School (MES) is an all-girls private day school in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded in 1694 and has a roll of around 750 pupils. The majority of its pupils live in the surrounding area (Edinburgh, Lothian and Fife) but board ...

and went on to study botany at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...

from 1920 to 1935, under Dr Malcolm Wilson, where she earned an honours degree in botany. She then earned a PhD on the mycological aspects of seed pathology. After university, she joined the plant pathology service of the Board of Agriculture (now known as SASA) based in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. In Noble's career on plant pathology, seeds were her main focus. In 1958 she was elected as 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 ...

(one of the few female Fellows). Her proposers were Malcolm Wilson,

Charles Edward Foister Dr Charles Edward Foister FRSE (17 August 1903 – 23 July 1989) was a British botanist and plant pathologist. He was Director of Scottish Agricultural Scientific Services in Edinburgh from 1957. He specialised in lichens and fungi. Life He wa ...

, John Anthony and Sir

William Wright Smith Sir William Wright Smith (2 February 1875 Lochmaben, Dumfriesshire – 15 December 1956) was a Scottish botanist and horticulturalist. Life He was born at Parkend farm near Lochmaben in Dumfriesshire, the son of James T. Smith, a farmer. He was ...

. She won the Society's Gunning Victoria Jubilee Prize. As well as becoming a Fellow, she also served as a councillor for

British Mycological Society The British Mycological Society is a learned society established in 1896 to promote the study of fungi. Formation The British Mycological Society (BMS) was formed by the combined efforts of two local societies: the Woolhope Naturalists' Fiel ...

and the

Association of Applied Biologists The Association of Applied Biologists (AAB) is a United Kingdom biological science learned society. From its foundation in 1904 until 1934, the institution was the Association of Economic Biologists. It publishes research and holds conferences i ...

. She was also a member of the International Seed Testing Association and, along with Dr Paul Neergaard and Dr Jo deTempe, produced an ''Annotated List of Seed-borne Diseases (4th edition, ISTA , 1990).'' In 1971, she retired as principal scientific officer for seed pathology and mycology at the Agriculture Scientific Society for the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for Scotland. Noble retired in 1971 and died on 20 July 2002 in

Lasswade Lasswade is a village and civil parish in Midlothian, Scotland, on the River North Esk, south of Edinburgh city centre, contiguous with Bonnyrigg and between Dalkeith to the east and Loanhead to the west. Melville Castle lies to the north ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Noble, Mary Jessie MacDonald 1911 births 2002 deaths People educated at the Mary Erskine School Scottish biologists British women biologists Scientists from Edinburgh Alumni of the University of Edinburgh Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Companions of the Imperial Service Order 20th-century British biologists