Baruch Blumberg was one of the most influential and important biomedical researchers of the twentieth century. Fueled by an inherent curiosity, he discovered and then created the vaccine for the hepatitis B virus. In doing so he created what some have dubbed the first cancer drug and saved millions of lives. Dr. Blumberg began his illustrious career by joining the US Navy and ended it as an astrobiologist.

Born Baruch Samuel Blumberg in New York City, he grew up in a depression-era United States and was a proud "25er", being born in 1925. He attended the Yeshiva of Flatbush in Brooklyn and finished his primary education at Far Rockaway High School in Queens. Blumberg joined the United States Navy in 1943, served on a PT boat during World War Two, and remained in the Navy reserve after the war. He studied as an undergraduate at Union College where he received a degree in physics and mathematics in 1946. Shortly thereafter, he began graduate work in mathematics, but, with the advice of his father, altered course to pursue a medical degree. In the summer of 1950, as part of his medical schooling, he travelled to Moengo, Suriname, where he worked in a small clinic of a mining town on the outskirts of the Amazon forest. Between performing clinical services and conducting malaria surveys he became increasingly interested in the way different ethnicities responded to different diseases. The town itself was a melting pot of various cultures and ethnic groups including Native Americans, Javanese, Africans and Chinese. His first published paper was on the variation in the response to infection with Wuchereria bancrofti among the residents of Moengo. Although the environment and other factors were thought to contribute to most of the differences in reaction, Blumberg was intrigued by the possibility that there were inherited differences as well that caused the varied responses. It was these initial observations that would inform and direct a long career of biomedical research and discovery.

Graduating in 1951 with an M.D. from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, he worked for two years as an intern and assistant resident at the First (Columbia) Division of Bellevue Hospital until 1953. He spent the following two years as a Clinical Fellow in Medicine at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center. From 1955 until 1957 he was a graduate student, working towards a PhD, in the Department of Biochemistry at Oxford University, England and a member of Balliol College to which he would return decades later to assume the position of Master.

While working on his PhD at Balliol, Dr. Blumberg went on his first trip to West Africa to take blood samples to study the inherited polymorphisms of the serum proteins of milk and hemoglobin. It was this study of inherited polymorphisms that would ultimately lead to the discovery of several new polymorphisms and the hepatitis B virus (HBV). Blumberg worked at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), from 1957 until 1964, where he was chief of the Geographic Medicine and Genetics Section. He continued his work on polymorphisms and made various connections that would be integral to his work on hepatitis B.

While researching inherited differences at the NIH, Dr. Blumberg and his team developed a method for testing patients suffering from blood diseases such as leukemia and hemophilia. Patients who had these diseases needed frequent blood transfusions, and Blumberg hypothesized that since they had received so many transfusions, the patients would develop multiple antibodies against "foreign proteins" or "antigens" that they had not inherited. These antibodies could then be used to identify the inherited factor or genetic difference. The researchers discovered a new antibody, which reacted with a protein found in the blood of an Australian Aborigine. Thus, the new antibody was called the "Australian antigen." After extensive testing, it was suspected that the "Australian antigen" was the cause of the serum hepatitis—the name then used for the infection that would later be known as hepatitis B. In 1967, having left the NIH, the suspicion was formally confirmed: the Australian antigen was the hepatitis B virus.

This discovery allowed blood donors to be checked for HBV, which dramatically reduced post-transfusion hepatitis infection and saved many lives. Most people who are infected with HBV develop antibodies to overwhelm the outer protein coat of the virus (the surface antigen HBsAg) and in doing so overcome the disease. However, about 1 person in 100 becomes a carrier. The existence of a human carrier for HBV allowed Blumberg to obtain the immunizing antigen directly from the blood of that carrier. The HBsAg was subsequently purified and proved to be a safe, effective vaccine. Blumberg shared the 1976 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with D. Carleton Gajdusek (who did similar work on the disease kuru) for their "discoveries concerning new mechanisms for the origin and dissemination of infectious diseases."

Hepatitis B is a dangerous disease and is 100 times more infectious than HIV . Chronic hepatitis can lead to liver cancer, which is the fifth most common cause of cancer death in males throughout the world and the eighth in women. The fact that hepatitis B can lead to liver cancer means that the original hepatitis B vaccine was the first known cancer vaccine. As Jonathan Chertoff, scientific director at the Fox Chase Cancer Center, said "I think it's fair to say that [Baruch Blumberg] prevented more cancer deaths than any person who's ever lived." The hepatitis B vaccine was made in such an unprecedented way that in 1993 Blumberg and his colleague Irving Millman were elected to the National Inventors Hall of Fame. In light of all Blumberg's achievements, World Hepatitis Day has been moved to the date of his birth, July 28th.

In 1964 Blumberg left the NIH and joined The Institute for Cancer Research (later known as Fox Chase Cancer Center). He continued to be part of the Institute until his death in 2011. He filled many senior roles at FCCC, including Associate Director of Clinical Research, Vice President for Population Oncology and Distinguished Scientist and continued to be a leading name in hepatitis B and cancer research. Outside of FCCC Blumberg was Professor of Anthropology and Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and became a visiting Professor in India (Bangalore), Singapore, University of Kentucky, Indiana University, the University of Otago (New Zealand), Oxford University, and Stanford University.

After receiving the Nobel Prize, Blumberg spent the next few years traveling the world, visiting places such as Taiwan (which became the first country to have a national vaccination program) and Beijing to help pass on the knowledge of the prevention of hepatitis B to the areas that needed it most. In 1984, three years after the HBV vaccine was approved by the FDA, he was elected into the American Philosophical Society, where he would later serve as president. Five years later, in 1989, he became the Master of Balliol College at Oxford University. Blumberg was the first American and the first scientist (with the exception of a 14th century alchemist) to become master of Oxford University's oldest college .

In 1999, Dr. Blumberg became the founding Director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI). He was tasked with trying to find the answer to three questions: How does life begin and evolve? Does life exist elsewhere in the universe? And what is life's future on Earth and beyond? This was a bold choice of career path; not only was astrobiology considered a fringe science at the time, but he had no experience in the field. He held the position for three years, until 2002, and later became the Senior Advisor for Biology to the Administrator of NASA. In March of 2003 he joined the Board of Trustees of the SETI Institute, expanding his involvement in the realm of astrobiology. In 2005 he was elected president of the American Philosophical Society and he remained in that position until his death in 2011 at the age of 85. He died shortly after delivering the keynote speech at the International Lunar Research Park Exploratory Workshop. Dr. Blumberg was a philosopher, an anthropologist and a scientist. He is survived by his wife, four children and nine grandchildren.

The Baruch S. Blumberg papers are arranged alphabetically unless otherwise noted in the series descriptions. Some of the oversized or odd format materials at the end of the collection include arrangement by size or format.

Physical description

The collection is 458 linear feet.

Restrictions

The Baruch S. Blumberg Papers include personal medical information in several series. Personal medical information is considered restricted material and the curator of manuscripts should be consulted before requesting. Notes have been added to files that include such information.

Separated material

The Research Data series covers several types: 1) bulk statistical data, 2) medical research surveys/questionnaires, 3) bulk forms from lab tests (usually from sera samples), and 4) materials with personal medical information (hospital admission records, tests and results, materials from participation in medical research, etc.). These materials generally have minimal research value or are restricted based on the presence of medical information.

Related material

The archives of Balliol College, Oxford University, holds materials from Baruch Blumberg's time as Master. These materials include records regarding the election of Dr. Blumberg as Master, administrative records, photographs, a bound volume of publications and talks by Blumberg while Master, some correspondence, and other materials. Contact the Curator of Manuscripts at APS and the Balliol College Archives and Manuscripts collection for further information.

• American Philosophical Society
• Balliol College (University of Oxford)
• Fox Chase Cancer Center. American Oncologic Hospital (AOH). Institute for Cancer Research (ICR)
• Library of Congress
• NASA Astrobiology Institute
• National Academy of Sciences (U.S.)
• Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant (Pa.)
• United States. National Institutes of Health
• University of Pennsylvania

• Rongelap Atoll (Marshall Islands)
• Senegal

• Blumberg, Baruch S., 1925-2011
• Economidou, Ioanna
• Hesser, Jana E.
• Knudson, Alfred G., Dr. (Alfred George)
• Lechat, M. F. (Michel F.), 1927-2014 -- Correspondence
• London, William Thomas, 1932-2017
• Millman, Irving, 1923-2012
• Prehn, Liisa Melartin -- Correspondence
• Talbot, Timothy R., Jr., Dr., 1916-1988
• Vierucci, Alberto

• AIDS (Disease)
• Blood Transfusion
• Blood banks
• Cancer -- Research
• Down syndrome
• Hepatitis.
• Leprosy.
• Liver Cancer
• Nobel Prizes.
• Rheumatism
• Science Philosophy