Frank Burnet

Burnet, Frank

 

Born Sept. 3, 1899, in Traralgon, Victoria. Australian virologist.

Burnet graduated from the University of Melbourne and became a professor there. He is director of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. His principal studies are devoted to the ecology of viruses, the interrelations of viruses and their hosts, the reproductive mechanism of viruses, and their changeability. He was the first to study the virus that produces Q fever and that is named for him (Rickettsia burneti). Burnet approached human viral diseases from evolutionary and ecological points of view. He received the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine (1960).

WORKS

Viruses and Man. London, 1953.
Principles of Animal Virology. New York, 1955.
Integrity of the Body. Cambridge (Mass.), 1962.
In Russian translation:
Virus kak organizm. Moscow, 1947.