Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: acquired immunological tolerance

  • Sir Peter Medawar and the discovery of acquired immune tolerance

    At Oxford during World War II, Peter Medawar and his colleagues made the remarkable observation that patients pre-treated in early life with embryotic cells did not reject skin grafts from unrelated donors. This gave rise to the concept of acquired immunological tolerance and revolutionized the field of organ transplantation as well as changed our understanding…

  • Anne McLaren, transfusion, transplantation, and the nature of blood

    Matthew HolmesCambridge, UK Anne McLaren, Oxford-trained zoologist and first female Officer of the Royal Society, once claimed that “History may be circular, but the history of science is helical: it repeats itself, but each time at a deeper level.”1 To see the helical nature of the history of science in action, we need look no…