Daniel McGillivray Brown

Daniel McGillivray Brown FRS
File:Daniel McGillivray Brown.gif
Born	(1923-02-03)3 February 1923 Giffnock, Scotland
Died	24 April 2012(2012-04-24) (aged 89) Cambridge, England
Nationality	British
Alma mater	Glasgow University
Known for	Mutagenics Structure of RNA
Spouse	Margaret Joyce Herbert
Children	Catherine, David, Frances and Moira
Scientific career
Institutions	Chester Beatty Research Institute University of Cambridge University of California, LA Brandeis University Laboratory of Molecular Biology

Daniel McGillivray Brown FRS (3 February 1923 – 24 April 2012) was a Scottish nucleic acid chemist.

Biography

Daniel McGillivray Brown was born in Giffnock on 3 February 1923, son of David Cunninghame Brown, a restaurateur, and Catherine Stewart (née McGillivray), a teacher. After Giffnock Primary School he attended Glasgow Academy and then, at age 17, Glasgow University where he studied chemistry, and received an honours degree.

In 1945 Brown moved to the Chester Beatty Research Institute, then in Chelsea, where he worked on the synthesis of heterocyclic stilbene derivatives for his PhD.

Then, in 1948, Brown moved to Cambridge to join Alexander Todd’s group. Here, he set out to confirm the furanose chemical structure of the sugar part of nucleosides in natural nucleic acids, which had only been inferred at the time. He and Basil Lythgoe proved this to be the case. He gained his second PhD in 1952. He later worked on the selective phosphorylation of nucleosides to form nucleotides. This was the beginning of a lifelong career, and led to the chemical structures of RNA and, by inference, DNA.

Brown was appointed lecturer in the chemistry department in 1959, and reader in 1967. During this period he worked on phosphoinositides and the mutagenesis of nucleotides. He was Visiting Professor at University of California, Los Angeles 1959–60; and at Brandeis University 1966–67.

In 1981 Brown took a sabbatical at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) and, a year later, moved there permanently. He retired formally from the LMB in 2002 but continued publishing until 2008. Brown was awarded ScD in 1968, and became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1982.

Family

Daniel Brown met Margaret Joyce Herbert at Scottish Highland Dancing classes at the CUSRC in 1952. They married in Lincolnshire the following year. Dan and Margaret had four children: Catherine (1954), David (1955), Frances (1961) and Moira (1963). David died in 1996. Margaret died in 2022.

Daniel McGillivray Brown died at his home in Cambridge on 24 April 2012. He was survived by his wife, three daughters, four grandchildren and a great grand-daughter.