Archibald Hill

Archibald Hill
Born	26 September 1886(1886-09-26) Bristol, England
Died	3 June 1977(1977-06-03) (aged 90) Cambridge, England
Nationality	United Kingdom
Fields	Physiology and biophysics
Institutions	Cambridge University University of Manchester University College, London
Alma mater	Cambridge University
Doctoral advisor	Walter Morley Fletcher
Doctoral students	Bernard C. Abbott Bernard Katz
Known for	Mechanical work in muscles Muscle contraction model Founding biophysics Hill equation
Notable awards	Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1922)
Notes He is notably the father of Polly Hill, David Keynes Hill, Maurice Hill, and the grandfather of Nicholas Humphrey.

Archibald Vivian Hill CH CBE FRS (26 September 1886 – 3 June 1977) was an English physiologist, one of the founders of the diverse disciplines of biophysics and operations research. He shared the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his elucidation of the production of heat and mechanical work in muscles.

Biography

Born in Bristol, he was educated at Blundell's School and graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge as third wrangler in the mathematics tripos before turning to physiology. His early work involved the characterization of what came to be known as Michaelis-Menten kinetics and the use of the Hill coefficient. Hill's first paper, published in 1909 while working under the supervision of John Newport Langley, is the landmark in the history of receptor theory.

Hill made many exacting measurements of the physics of nerves and muscles. His earliest experiments on the heat production of contracting muscles used equipment obtained from the Swedish physiologist Magnus Blix. Both before and after World War I he worked on a range of topics in physiology in cooperation with colleagues in Cambridge, Germany and elsewhere.

Hill 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 (1918-2000) 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 for this work.

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. In 1933, he became with Lord Beveridge and Lord Rutherford a founder member and vice-president of the Academic Assistance Council (which became the Society for the Protection of Science and Learning in 1936). By the start of the Second World War, the organization had saved 900 academics (18 of whom went on to win Nobel Prizes) from the Nazi persecution. He served as an independent Member of Parliament (MP) for Cambridge University from 1940 to 1945. He took part in many scientific missions to the U.S.

Honours and awards

• Commander of the Order of the British Empire (1918)
• Fellow of the Royal Society (1918)
• Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1922)
• Companion of Honour (1946)
• Copley Medal of the Royal Society (1948)

References

• Katz, B. (1986). "Archibald Vivian Hill", Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Oxford, p. 406
• Lusk, G. (1925). Lectures on nutrition: 1924-1925. Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Company. 
• Stevenson, L.G. (1953). Nobel Prize Winners in Medicine and Physiology: 1901-1950.. New York: Henry Schuman. 
• David R. Bassett, Jr. (2002). "Scientific Contributions of A.V. Hill: Exercise Physiology Pioneer", Journal of Applied Physiology, 93 p. 1567-1582
• Nobel biography