Background
PHILLIPS, David Chilton was born on March 7, 1924 in Ellesmere, Shropshire.
biologist chemist Member of the House of Lords
PHILLIPS, David Chilton was born on March 7, 1924 in Ellesmere, Shropshire.
David Phillips solved the structure of lysozyme and also explained the mechanism of its action in destroying certain bacteria by a brilliant application of the technique of X-ray crystallography, a technique to which he had been introduced as a Doctor of Philosophy student at the University in Cardiff, and to which he later made major instrumental contributions.
Phillips was the first person to determine in atomic detail the structure of the enzyme lysozyme, which he did in the Davy Faraday Laboratories of the Royal Institution in London in 1965. Lysozyme, which was discovered in 1922 by Alexander Fleming, is found in tear drops, nasal mucus, gastric secretions and egg white. Lysozyme exhibits some antibacterial activity so that the discovery of its structure and mode of action were key scientific objectives.
Education and David Chilton Phillips, the son of a tailor and Methodist preacher, was born in Ellesmere, Shropshire which gave rise to his title Baron Phillips of Ellesmere.
He was educated at Oswestry Boy"s High School and then at the University College of South Wales and Monmouth where he studied physics, electrical engineering, and mathematics. His degree was interrupted between 1944 and 1947 for service in the Royal Navy as a radar officer on HMS Illustrious.
He returned to Cardiff to complete his degree and subsequently undertook postgraduate studies with Professor Arthur J. C. Wilson, a noted X-ray crystal physicist. After a brief postdoctoral period at the National Council in Ottawa (1951-1955) he joined the Royal Institution.
In 1968 he became the Professor of Molecular Biophysics in the Department of Zoology at the University of Oxford where he remained until his retirement in 1985.
During that time he became a Fellow of the Royal Society and then its Biological Secretary from 1976 to 1983. Lectures Lord Phillips died of cancer, on 23 February 1999.
David was made a Knight Bachelor in 1979, invested as Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in 1989, and created a Life Peer as Baron Phillips of Ellesmere, of Ellesmere in the County of Shropshire on 14 July 1994. In the House of Lords, he chaired the select committee on Science and Technology and he is credited with getting Parliament onto the World Wide Web. In 1994, he was awarded an Honorary Degree (Doctor of Science) by the University of Bath.
Council European Molecular Biology Organization 1972-1978, Medical Research Council 1974-1978. American Academy, of Arts and Sciences 1968. Royal Swedish Academy 1989.
Married Diana Kathleen Hutchinson in 1960.
