Kenneth Manley Smith

Kenneth Manley Smith (13 November 1892, Helensburgh, Scotland – 11 June 1981) was a British entomologist and plant pathologist, known for his pioneering research on both insect viruses and plant viruses.

Biography Kenneth M. Smith, the son of a civil engineer, had three brothers and four sisters. He was his parents' fifth child and youngest son. His parents were English and his ancestors included many engineers, architects, parsons, and civil servants. At age two, he moved with his family to West Dulwich, South London, where he grew up. In boyhood, he was interested in natural history and enjoyed collecting butterflies and moths. He was a student at Dulwich College Preparatory School from 1902 to 1907 and at Dulwich College from 1907 to 1911. At the Royal College of Science (now part of Imperial College London), he matriculated in 1911 and graduated in 1914. He served on the western front from September 1914 to January 1915, when he was invalided out and discharged. He returned to the Royal College of Science, where he did research with Herbert Greenway Newth on the development of collar cavities in lancelets (also known as amphioxi). At the Royal College of Science, Smith also did research on the antennal sense organs of Diptera and how feeding by capsid bugs damages plant tissues. His collaborators include Roy Markham, Ralph Wyckoff, N. Xeros, Claude F. Rivers, and Robley C. Williams. Smith was the first to recognize the tomato bushy stunt virus, the turnip yellow mosaic virus, and the tobacco necrosis virus. In collaboration with Douglas E. Lea, he did pioneering research on the effects of ionizing radiation on viruses. Smith was primarily responsible for the discovery of the cytoplasmic polyhedrosis viruses.

In 1952 Kurt Jacoby of the Academic Press selected Kenneth M. Smith and Max A. Lauffer (1914–2012) as editors-in-chief of the book series "Advances in Virology". The first volume of the series was published in 1953. Smith also served on the editorial board of the journal Parasitology. (1928–2022).

At age 77, Smith returned to Cambridge, where he completed the 3rd edition of A Textbook of Plant Virus Diseases (published in 1972) and two other books.