Background
Collip was born on November 20, 1892, in Belleville, Ontario. His father, James Dennis Collip, operated a vegetable and flower shop in Belleville; his mother, Mahala Vance, was a former schoolteacher.
1914
Toronto, Canada
Collip as a graduate student, ca. 1914. The Discovery and Early Development of Insulin Digital Collection, Toronto
6 Hoskin Ave, Toronto, ON M5S 1H8, Canada
Collip enrolled at Trinity College at the University of Toronto at the age of 15, receiving Bachelor of Arts in 1912, Master of Arts (1913) and a Ph.D. (1916).
Collip was born on November 20, 1892, in Belleville, Ontario. His father, James Dennis Collip, operated a vegetable and flower shop in Belleville; his mother, Mahala Vance, was a former schoolteacher.
Collip enrolled at Trinity College at the University of Toronto at the age of 15. In 1912 he received his Bachelor of Arts degree, graduating at the head of his class, then went on to obtain the Master of Arts in 1913 and a Ph.D. in biochemistry in 1916. His graduate training was under the direction of A. B. Macallum.
He received honorary degrees from nine Canadian universities and from Harvard (1936), Oxford (1946), and the University of London (1948).
In 1915 Collip received his first academic appointment, as lecturer in biochemistry at the University of Alberta. Here he had a heavy teaching load in a department depleted of staff by the war, but he was nevertheless able to continue his research. In 1916 he published the first of his many contributions to medical literature, a paper entitled “Internal Secretions,” which he had presented to the Alberta Medical Association. Although in the nature of a review, it reveals Collip’s thinking in this field, which was to be his major interest. His early papers, however, were concerned mainly with the comparative blood chemistry of vertebrates and invertebrates. He recorded some new findings on the alkali reserve of plasma, acid-base exchange, and osmotic pressure of blood serum. In 1920 he wrote On the Formation of Hydrochloric Acid in the Gastric Tubercules of the Vertebrate Stomach, which included many of his own observations made while working toward his Ph.D.
In 1921 Collip was awarded a Rockefeller Traveling Fellowship to visit laboratories in North America and England. This proved to be a decisive turning point toward a career in endocrine research. His first visit was to Toronto, where there was intense interest in the development of a pancreatic extract to combat diabetes. This possibility so caught Collip’s imagination that he gave up the fellowship to become an assistant professor in the department of pathological chemistry at Toronto. He was subsequently asked by J. J. R. Macleod, head of the department of physiology, to join the group working with Banting and Best on the new hormone “insulin.”
Collip developed a method for the preparation of insulin from cattle or hog pancreas, employing alcohol in varying concertrations to obtain a differential precipitation of impurities. The resulting extract was sufficiently pure to allow the clinical group to test its action in humans. The first clinical results with insulin were published in March 1922 by Banting, Best, Collip, Campbell, and Fletcher, under the title “Pancreatic Extracts in the Treatment of Diabetes Mellitus.” Over the short interval of two years the Toronto group published fifteen fundamental papers and ten communication-abstracts that constituted an extensive contribution to knowledge of insulin and carbohydrate metabolism. In 1923 Banting and Macleod were the first Canadians to receive the Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine; in recognition of the parts played by their collaborators, they shared the monetary gifts with Best and Collip.
With the breakup of the group of collaborators in Toronto, Collip returned to Edmonton in 1922 to continue research as professor of biochemistry; he earned the Doctor of Science in 1924 and the M.D. in 1926. During five years in Edmonton, he made some of his most important contributions to medicine by relating the hormonal control of calcium and phosphorus metabolism to an active principle in the parathyroid gland. This original work was published in 1926 as “The Extraction of a Parathyroid Hormone Which Will Prevent or Control Parathyroid Tetany and Which Regulates the Level of Blood Calcium,” The extensive discoveries made in this field at Edmonton are presented in Collip’s Harvey Lectures of 1925-1926.
In 1927, at the age of thirty-five, Collip became chairman and head of the department of biochemistry at McGill University. The next eleven years were the most productive of his career and, with a large group of distinguished collaborators that included David L. Thomson and Hans Selye, he published more than 200 papers. They contributed to nearly every facet of endorcrinology, particularly to pituitary function. Most of the projects centered on Collip, who had the remarkable ability to handle large concentrates of glands, purify them to manageable proportions, and separate out various hormone function. His restless and inquisitive nature led him to explore one area rapidly and then pass on to another. Many other laboratories benefited therefore, from his original observations as they proceeded to develop them. Throughout his life Collip explored areas of research in which it seemed directly possible to discover new treatments for human diseases.
Collip’s interest in placental gonadotrophic hormones led him to the complex problems of the production by the anterior lobe of the pituitary of gonadotrophic and other trophic hormones. In the early 1930’s little was known of the nature or even the number of different hormones this part of the pituitary produced, and new animal models (chiefly the hypophysectomized rat) had to be developed to allow their assay. By 1933 Collip had separated pituitary growth hormone essentially free from both adrenocorticotrophic hormone (ACTH) and thyrotrophic hormone (TSH), which tended to run closely together in pituitary gland extracts. The preparation of seperated “pure” hormones allowed extensive investigations of their often complicated actions. ACTH was prepared in sufficiently pure form to be administered to patients. Unfortunately, it was not used to treat any of the diseases against which it is now known to be effective.
Collip envisioned the development of “anti-hormones” as a normal physiological means of maintaining hormone homeostasis. This theory created great interest; and although it was later shown that closely bound nonspecific proteins and not the pure hormones probably led to this reaction, it focused attention on the possible influence of immune reactions in endocrine therapy.
In 1938 Collip abandoned research to devote most of his time to the organization of medical research in Canada, first as a member of the newly created Associate Committee for Medical Research of the National Research Council and later as chairman, succeeding Sir Frederick Banting. He was also medical liasion officer to the United States. He was decorated for his work by both the Canadian and United States governments. After the war Collip continued his administrative responsibilities as director and chairman of the Medical Advisory Committee of the National Research Council until his retirement at the age of sixty-five.
In 1941 Collip resigned his position in the department of biochemistry to become the Gilman Cheney professor of endocrinology and director of the Institute of Endocrinology at McGill. Although not participating personally in the research in his new laboratory, he closely followed its work. During these years the staff of the laboratory published thirty-eight papers containing significant contributions to such widely separated fields as experimental traumatic shock, motion sickness, audiometry, and blood preservation.
In 1947 Collip resigned from McGill to become dean of medicine at the University of Western Ontario and director of the department of medical research at the new Collip Medical Research Laboratory. Here he formed an active research group, and many graduate students benefited from training in his department. By 1965 more than 125 publications had originated from this laboratory. Collip retired as dean of medicine in 1961 but continued as director of the laboratory until his sudden death in 1965.
Collip never aspired to be a public figure; and his modesty and inherent shyness made him reluctant to lecture or give papers, even to scientific audiences. At first meeting he gave the impression of abruptness, but one soon realized that behind this manner were shyness and great personal charm. Collip had strong family ties and made many lasting friendships.
Collip married Ray Ralph in December, 1915.