Burnet, Sir Macfarlane, << muk FAHR luhn >> (1899-1985), an Australian physician and virologist, shared the 1960 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine with British biologist Peter Brian Medawar. In 1949, Burnet and his colleague Frank Fenner proposed the theory of acquired immunological tolerance. They stated that an animal’s immune system develops gradually during fetal life and if foreign tissues were introduced into the fetus early in its development, the fetus would accept the tissues as its own. Later, if tissues from the same foreign source were introduced into the adult animal, the immune system would not reject the tissues. Acquired immunological tolerance was later proved by Medawar and his colleagues.
Burnet also developed a method of cultivating viruses in chick embryos. For many years, this method was widely used by scientists to grow and study viruses.
Burnet was born on Sept. 3, 1899, in Traralgon, Victoria. His full name was Frank Macfarlane Burnet. In 1960, he was the recipient of the first Australian of the Year award. He died on Aug. 31, 1985.
