Obituary of Patrick Gaffney

Abstract

Patrick Gaffney was born in Cork, Ireland in 1934, and educated at the National University of Ireland, graduating with a BSc and first‐class honours in 1957. A year later, after working as a demonstrator, he was awarded an MSc, before moving to England, where he obtained a Diploma of Biochemistry at Reading University. After a research appointment with Lever Brothers, he went Ohio State University, where, in 1965, he was awarded a PhD for his work on fibrin polymerization. Patrick then obtained a postdoctoral fellowship in the American Red Cross Blood research laboratory, where he was an important member of the group that isolated hemoglobin Hammersmith, published in Nature in 1966. He then returned to the UK when he was appointed to the MRC staff at the abnormal hemoglobin research unit in the Department of Biochemistry of Cambridge University. In 1969, he left Cambridge after being appointed to the staff of the National Institute for Medical Research and the National Institute of Biological Standards and Control of the MRC at Mill Hill and South Mimms, where he remained until he retired in 1999. In the course of his long and distinguished career, he was awarded a DSc from the National University of Ireland in 1976 and an honorary MRCPath & FRCPath from the Royal College of Pathologists of England. He held visiting professorships at the University of Notre Dame in the USA, the University of Leuven in Belgium, the University of Dublin in Ireland, and Guys and St Thomas's in London. He was a founder member of the ‘Haemostasis Club’ and a member of the ISTH, the Biochemical Society, and the Atherosclerosis Discussion Group. He was on the committee of the ISTH and the chairman of various sub‐committees. He edited the Thrombosis Research for 13 years, and was on the Editorial Boards of Thrombosis and Haemostasis and Fibrinolysis for many years. He held two MRC project grants and a Wellcome project grant, and published over 200 original papers in peer‐reviewed journals, many in association with his PhD students and worldwide collaborators. Five of his papers were published in Nature and two in the Lancet, and many were published in the specialist journals Thombosis and Fibrinolysis. His major research interests were the standardization of the components of hemostasis and the molecular pathology of thrombosis, atherosclerosis and metastasis of malignant tumors. His work on developing and standardizing biochemical assays for the plasminogen activators underpinned many other studies on the basic mechanisms of thrombus formation and resolution and metastasis. Patrick was a staunch Catholic and had a long and happy marriage to Dianah, an Australian, with whom he had a large family and of whom he was immensely proud. He was a keen golfer and an avid Irish rugby supporter. He had a large group of local and international friends who all found his company both entertaining and stimulating. He was a genuinely good man of strong principles. He would not be involved in research utilizing tissue taken from human embryos. When he was bequeathed a house by a man who he had befriended, he gave a considerable amount of the proceeds to the church. Sadly, he developed malignant melanoma, and earlier this year faced up to his final illness with great courage, while always enquiring whether new treatments could cure his tumor. Patrick passed away on 1 March 2013. Patrick's unique sense of humor will also be sadly missed by his friends and colleagues. The author states that he has no conflict of interest.