John Gaddum

Sir John Henry Gaddum (31 March 1900 – 30 June 1965) was an English pharmacologist who, along with Ulf von Euler, co-discovered the neuropeptide Substance P in 1931.

Early life and education He was born in Hale (now part of Manchester) the son of silk merchant, Henry Edwin Gaddum and his wife Phyllis Mary Barratt. He was educated at Moorland House School, Heswall, Cheshire; Rugby School; and Trinity College, Cambridge.

Career From 1927 to 1933, Gaddum worked under Henry Dale at the National Institute for Medical Research, and helped develop the classical laws of drug antagonism. He showed that sympathetic nerves release adrenaline. Together with Ulf von Euler, he established the release of acetylcholine in autonomic ganglia.

He was director of the Institute of Animal Physiology (later Babraham Institute) from 1958 to 1965. and invested by The Duke of Edinburgh.

In experiments with lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), Gaddum explained how it causes mental disturbances by blocking the stimulating effects of serotonin.

In 1962 he was elected a Member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina.