Robin Coombs

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Robert "Robin" Royston Amos Coombs (born  January 9, 1921 in London , †  February 25, 2006 in Cambridge ) was a British veterinarian, serologist and immunologist . He was one of the discoverers of the Coombs test , which detects the presence of antigens (antiglobulins) in Rh intolerance .

Live and act

Coombs enjoyed part of his schooling in South Africa and then studied in Edinburgh . He obtained a doctorate in veterinary medicine at the local university . He later received honorary doctorates from the Universities of Guelph , the Netherlands and Edinburgh, Scotland , and was a member of the Royal Society (1965), a member of the Royal College of Pathologists and an honorary member of the Royal College of Physicians . In 1965 he was awarded a Gairdner Foundation International Award , in 1988 with the Clemens von Pirquet Medal .

Coombs was appointed professor and conducted research as a serologist and blood group specialist at the Department of Pathology at Cambridge University ; he was the founder of the local immunology department. Modern methods of traces of blood can also be traced back to his work (the Coombs test on human blood and mixed agglutination found their way into forensic science between 1955 and 1965 for blood trace examinations ).

In 1963, together with Philip George Houthem Gell , he developed a classification of immunological reactions that divided four types of allergic reaction .

Together with WE Parish and AF Wells, he considered the allergic reaction to proteins in cow's milk as a cause of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

literature

  • PGH Gell and RRA Coombs: Clinical Aspects of Immunology . Blackwell, London 1963.
  • Robin RA Coombs: Historical note: past, present and future of the antiglobulin test . In: Vox Sanguinis . Volume 74, No. 2, 1998, pp. 67-73. Abstract PMID 9501403
  • RRA Coombs, WE Parish, and AF Walls: Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Could a healthy infant succumb to inhalation anaphylaxis during sleep leading to cot death? . Cambridge Publications Ltd., 2000, ISBN 0-9540081-0-3

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jürgen Thorwald : The hour of the detectives. Becomes and worlds of criminology. Droemer Knaur, Zurich and Munich 1966, pp. 269–274.
personal data
SURNAME Coombs, Robin
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Coombs, Robert Royston Amos (real name); Coombs, Robin Royston Amos
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British doctor and immunologist
DATE OF BIRTH January 9, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH February 25, 2006
Place of death Cambridge