Barrie Marmion

Barrie Patrick Marmion (20 May 1920 – 12 July 2014) was an English microbiologist who spent the majority of his career in Australia. He is known for his work on Q fever, and led the team that developed the first vaccine against the bacteria that causes it.

Early life Barrie Marmion was born in 1920 in Alverstoke, Hampshire, to Joseph, a pharmacist, and Melita "Millie" Marmion. He began studying medicine at University College London in 1939 and, after a brief secondment to the Welsh National School of Medicine because of the war, graduated in 1944.

Career Marmion began his medical career at the Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS) as a trainee in pathology; he was seconded in this position to Cambridge and Colindale, working in the virus reference laboratory at the latter. where he studied Murray Valley encephalitis virus and respiratory viruses alongside Macfarlane Burnet. Marmion returned to the UK in 1952, joining Michael Stoker's Q fever research group at Cambridge University. He moved to Leeds as the head of the new PHLS virus laboratory in 1955.

Marmion returned to Melbourne in 1963 as the Foundation Professor of Microbiology at the newly established Monash University Medical School. He expanded the institute's diagnostic laboratory service and led a research group that was, at the time, a leader in virology research in Australia. He observed that Q fever led to a post-viral illness and hypothesised that it could cause chronic fatigue syndrome. and received the Gold Medal of the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia. He chaired Australia's National Health and Medical Research Council for many years and served as president of the Australian Society for Microbiology from 1984 to 1986. He was a life member of the American Society for Rickettsiology and had a subspecies of Rickettsia honei, Rickettsia honei var. marmionii, named after him.