Vale Don Metcalf AC

Professor Donald Metcalf AC, an outstanding Australian medical researcher whose discovery of colony stimulating factors (CSFs) has benefited millions of people with immunodeficiency, passed away this week at the age of 85.

Metcalf joined the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute in 1954 as a young medical graduate, supported by Cancer Council Victoria’s Carden Fellowship, an award he held until his retirement in September 2014.

Metcalf’s studies of how blood production is controlled led to his speculation there must be a biological mechanism that controlled white blood cell production. He named them CSFs and they became the focus of more than 50 years of research.

Metcalf led researchers to characterise and purify four CSFs as well as recognising that CSFs had a potential role in clinical medicine. His team was among the first to discover the genes for CSFs.

Metcalf was a central figure in international clinical trials of CSFs in the 1980s. These trials assessed whether CSFs could boost immune cell numbers in cancer patients whose immune system was weakened as a side effect of the chemotherapy, leaving the patient susceptible to infection.

An estimated 20 million people have now been treated with CSFs.

As well as boosting the immune system in people treated with chemotherapy or with other immune deficiencies, CSFs have revolutionised blood stem cell transplantation, contributed to other diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, and medications that block CSF function are now entering clinical trials.

Metcalf was also a mentor to hundreds of young researchers and among his many honours and awards were the Companion of the Order of Australia (1993), the Royal Medal of the Royal Society (1995) and the Prime Minister’s Prize for Science (2001).

Metcalf died on 15 December 2014 at the age of 85 and is survived by his wife Jo, daughters Kate, Johanna, Penelope and Mary-Ann and their families