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Gordon Ada

Gordon Leslie Ada (b. December 6 1922) is an Australian microbiologist best known for his long leadership of the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University where Peter Doherty and Rolf Zinkernagel performed their Nobel winning research in his laboratory.

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Gordon Ada was born in 1922 in Sydney. He studied at the University of Sydney, graducating BSc in 1943, an MSc in 1946. After completing his Masters he went to London to work for the National Institute for Medical Research, staying in London until 1948. When he returned to Australia he conducted research at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research under director Frank Macfarlane Burnet and was involved in the establishment of the Biochemistry and Biophysics Research Unit with Henry Holden. At the Hall Institute he initially worked on virology including the viruses influenza and Murray Valley encephalitis, and was awarded his DSc by the University of Sydney in 1959. From 1962 he worked on immune reactions, demonstrating that antigens are not present in antibody produsing cells, in support of the clonal selection theory.

In 1968 Ada was appointed head of the Microbiology Department at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University, taking over from Frank Fenner. He held the position for 20 years; during his directorship the school became an international centre for the cellular immune response. He was also active in the World Health Organisation from 1971, his involvement lasting over 20 years. Ada left Australia in 1988 becoming Associate Director and then Director of Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health in Baltimore.

He is currently a visiting Professor at John Curtin, and is involved with the development of a HIV vaccine and has written a popular science title on vaccinations, Vaccination: The Facts, the Fears, the Future published in 2001.