Cyril Clarke

Sir Cyril Astley Clarke (22 August 1907 – 21 November 2000) was a British physician, geneticist and lepidopterist. He was honoured for his pioneering work on prevention of Rh disease of the newborn, and also for his work on the genetics of the Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths).

Biography Cyril Clarke was born on 22 August 1907 in Leicester, England and received his school education at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys, Leicester and at the independent Oundle School near Peterborough. His interest in butterflies and moths began at school. His studied natural science at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, graduating in 1929, and then medicine at Guy's Hospital, London, graduating in 1932.

Clarke helped to develop the technique of giving Rh-negative women inter-muscular injections of anti-RhD antibodies during pregnancy to prevent Rh disease in their newborn babies. This was one of the major advances in preventive medicine in the second half of the 20th century.

Clarke answered an advert in the Bulletin of the Amateur Entomologists’ Society for swallowtail butterfly pupae that had been placed by Philip Sheppard. They met and began working together in their common interest of lepidoptery. From 1959 they started running a moth trap in Caldy Common near West Kirby, Wirral, England. They studied the peppered moth, the scarlet tiger moth and swallowtail butterfly. They published papers on the genetics of Lepidoptera and also on Rh disease. Clarke continued research in his retirement and in 1988 he rediscovered a scarlet tiger moth colony on the Wirral Way, West Kirby, that had been started in 1961 by Philip Sheppard. The colony was useful for study of the genetics of changes in populations.

He married Frieda (or Féo) in 1934. Lady Clarke died in 1998. Cyril Clarke died in 2000. They had three sons, one of whom is a consultant neurologist.

Awards and accolades 1969 – Order of the British Empire (CBE) 19 March 1970 – Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) 1972 to 1977 – President of the Royal College of Physicians of London. 1974 – Knighted 1977 – Gairdner Foundation International Award 1980 – Lasker Award – Prof Cyril Clarke, together with Dr Ronald Finn, Dr John Gorman, Dr Vincent Freda, and Dr William Pollack were jointly awarded the Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research for their pioneering work on the rhesus blood group system, the role of rhesus D antibodies in the causation of Rh disease and the prevention of Rh disease. 1981 – Linnean Medal from the Linnean Society of London. 1990 – Buchanan Medal from the Royal Society of the United Kingdom for work on haemolytic disease of the newborn. 1992 – Honorary Degree given by the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia, United States.