Posted on 11/20/2001 11:06:30 AM PST by archy
Search continues in mysterious case of missing biologist
By Thomas Jordan
jordan@gomemphis.com
One of the world's leading structural biologists, whose abandoned rental car was discovered on the Hernando DeSoto Bridge last week, remained missing Monday. Dr. Don C. Wiley, 57, a Harvard University biochemistry and biophysics professor, was in Memphis attending the annual meeting of the Scientific Advisory Board of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. The board met Wednesday and Thursday at the hospital.
Wiley's rented white Mitsubishi Galant was discovered abandoned on the bridge at 4 a.m. Friday.
Police said the key was in the car's ignition switch and the vehicle's hazard lights hadn't been turned on. The car also had a full tank of gas.
Memphis Police Inspector Matt McCann said Monday Wiley's disappearance was baffling.
"We just don't know where he is right at the moment," McCann said. "There is no indication of foul play that we can determine at this point."
McCann said Wiley is "known throughout the world in his field. For him to suddenly disappear like this is of great concern to us. We're putting in a lot of man-hours trying to locate him."
Dr. William Evans, deputy director of St. Jude, said Wiley has been a member of the advisory board for about 10 years. The board, composed of 15 physicians and scientists, evaluates the hospital's programs through discussions with faculty members.
Evans said he talked with Wiley Thursday night after a dinner at The Peabody. He said Wiley was in a good mood.
"Don was always the life of the party in terms of any kind of conversation . . . and he was doing just that," Evans said.
Wiley is an accomplished scientist, Evans said.
"He has won some major scientific prizes. . . . He's been considered for the Nobel Prize. He's one of the world's premier scientists in his field."
Wiley is the John L. Loeb Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Harvard's Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology.
According to a biography of Wiley released by Harvard, he is "one of the most influential biologists of his generation." His work focuses on understanding the molecular mechanisms through which viruses infect cells and the resulting immune responses they elicit.
He recently had been investigating dangerous viruses including AIDS, Ebola, Herpes Simplex and influenza.
In 1999, Wiley and another Harvard professor, Dr. Jack Strominger, won the Japan Prize for their discoveries of how the immune system protects humans from infections.
Wiley and Strominger won the Albert Lasker Medical Research Awards in 1995 for their work on the immune system, which has shown how the body fights infection and rejects organ transplants.
- Thomas Jordan:
529-5880 November 20, 2001
-archy-/-
However, it seems to me that someone was in the car with him and made him get out - enter another vehicle. Perhaps the location would make it seem like suicide.
Unless it was one who had worked with Visna in particular, say back around 1980-'85.
-archy-/-
Probably true, but would not a structural biologist be important to developing counter measures to bio terror. Sort of like taking an all star linebacker off the field at game time. Just a thought.
Well, more like this sort of Visna. Or see the article from the USDA Agricultural Research magazine:
Toward Retrovirus-Resistant Sheep; Genetically engineered sheep; ovine progressive pneumonia; visna virus; encephalitis; pneumonia; arthritis; Caird E. Rexroad; Beltsville; MD Apr17 1994
Personally, I'd be more concerned if HPAI was the choice for a bioterror weapon- it's got far more possibilities for real economic and agricultural devestation.
-archy-/-
Suppose he had proved, once and for all, that Peter Duesberg, Karry Mullis, Mbeki, Hodgkinson, Lauritsen, Fintan Dunne, etc, and let's not forget Serge Lang, were all right; HIV is not the cause of AIDS and, possibly, AIDS is not a even a communicable disease. Billions of dollars would be at stake. People have been "disappeared" for far less.
* Too whom it may concern. I beat you to it.
Suppose he had proved, once and for all, that Peter Duesberg, Karry Mullis, Mbeki, Hodgkinson, Lauritsen, Fintan Dunne, etc, and let's not forget Serge Lang, were all right; HIV is not the cause of AIDS and, possibly, AIDS is not a even a communicable disease. Billions of dollars would be at stake. People have been "disappeared" for far less.
* Too whom it may concern. I beat you to it.
Of course, in Memphis, folks have also *been disappeared* for their shoes. Sometimes their bodies are found; sometimes not.
'Course if those Arkies from 'cross the river got ahold of him, the corpus delecti may be some local family's Thanksgiving dinner and likely will never be found. Bones, maybe.
-archy-/-
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