Archibald Hill
Archibald Vivian Hill CH CBE FRS (
September 26,
1886 –
June 3,
1977) was an
English physiologist, one of the founders of the diverse disciplines of
biophysics and
operations research. He shared (with
Otto Meyerhof) the
1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his elucidation of the production of
mechanical work in
muscles.
Born in
Bristol, he graduated from
Trinity College, Cambridge as third
wrangler in the
mathematics tripos before turning to
physiology. His early work involved the characterisation of what came to be known as
Michaelis-Menten kinetics and the use of the
Hill coefficient. He made many exacting measurements of the
physics of
nerves and muscles and is regarded, along with
Hermann Helmholtz as one of the founders of biophysics.
In
1913 he married Margaret Keynes, daughter of the economist
John Neville Keynes, and sister of the economist
John Maynard Keynes and the surgeon
Geoffrey Keynes. They had two sons and two daughters:
*
Polly Hill (
1914 -
2005), economist, married K.A.C. Humphreys, registrar of the West African Examinations Council.
*
David Keynes Hill (
1915-
2002), physiologist
*
Maurice Hill (
1919-
1966), oceanographer
* Janet Hill (?-?) child psychiatrist, married the immunologist
John Herbert Humphrey.
In
1914, at the outbreak of
World War I, Hill joined the
British army and assembled a team working on
ballistics and
operations research. The team included many notable
physicists including
Ralph H. Fowler,
Douglas Hartree and
Arthur Milne.
Hill returned to Cambridge in
1919 before taking the chair in physiology at the
Victoria University of Manchester in
1920. Parallelling the work of
German Otto Fritz Meyerhof he elucidated the processes whereby mechanical work is produced in muscles. The two shared the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine.
In
1923 he succeeded
Ernest Starling as professor of physiology at
University College, London, a post he held until his retirement in
1951. He continued as an active researcher until
1966.
World War II saw the beginning of Hill's extensive public service. Already in
1935 he was working with
Patrick Blackett and Sir
Henry Tizard on the committee that gave birth to
Radar. He served as independent
Member of Parliament for
Cambridge University (
1940-
1945), a post that enabled him to be active in defending fellow scientists persecuted by the regime of
Adolf Hitler. He took part in many scientific missions to the
USA.
*Commander of the
Order of the British Empire, (
1918)
*Fellow of the
Royal Society, (1918)
*
Companion of Honour, (
1946)
*
Copley Medal of the Royal Society, (
1948)
By Hill
*Hill, A.V. (1924-5).
Textbook of Anti-Aircraft Gunnery, 2 vols
*- (1927a).
Muscular Movement in Man*- (1927b).
Living Machinery*- (1932)
Chemical Wave Transmission in Nerve*
About Hill
*Katz, B. (1986). "Archibald Vivian Hill",
Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Oxford, p.406
*
*
Nobel biography
