| RefNo | EC/1974/29 |
| Previous numbers | Cert XIX, 140 |
| Level | Item |
| Title | Vane, John Robert: certificate of election to the Royal Society |
| Description | Citation typed |
| Citation | Distinguished for work on bioassays and prostaglandins. Developed new methods for assaying 5-hydroxytryptamine, bradykinin, caracholamines, angiotensin, vasopressin, oxytocin, histamine and prostaglandulins. Introduces the superfusion technique, to study release and fate of these substances in the circulation. Those that are not true hormones were inactivated by enzymic action in one passage through the lungs; this established a metabolic function of the lungs, that of protecting arterial blood from tissue hormones that diffuse into venous blood. Showed that release of renin from kidney is under reflex nervous control and that the converting enzyme which generates angiotensin II is fixed in the pulmonary circulation, probably in the endothelial cells. Studied release of prostaglandins in the lung and found that it occurs in response to various stimuli. His work on prostaglandins culminated in his discovery that aspirin-like substances inhibit synthesis of prostaglandins and that this mechanism is the explanation of their anti-inflammatory, antipyretic and analgesic action. Found in smooth muscle preparations that antipyretics inhibit 'myogenic' tone and contraction produced by anoxia and glucose lack, which are this explained by increased prostaglandin synthesis. Obtained evidence that prostaglandin release is involved in reactive hyperaemia and in the autoregulation of renal blood flow. |
| AccessStatus | Closed |
Fellows associated with this archive
| Code | PersonName | Dates |
| NA585 | Vane; Sir; John Robert (1927 - 2004) | 1927 - 2004 |