Obituary
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Obituary In Memoriam Harold S. Ginsberg (1917–2003) arold S. Ginsberg, a pioneer in the field of infectious diseases and molecular virology, died H on February 2nd, in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Harold (or Harry as he was almost universally known in the virology community) was born on May 27, 1917 in Daytona Beach, Florida. He was an undergraduate at Duke University, graduating with an AB in 1937. He then attended Tulane University and earned his MD in 1941. Following his Internship and Residency training, he served in the military and was posted to the United Kingdom at the time of the Normandy landings. During this period, he noticed a high occurrence of hepatitis in soldiers who had received blood transfusions. His investigations led to the discovery that the pooled plasma that was being used to treat the wounded was causing hepatitis. This work led to changes in medical treatments that saved the lives of many servicemen in World War II. It also stimulated research efforts that eventually led to the discovery and isolation of Hepatitis B virus. For his efforts, Harry was awarded the Legion of Merit Award by the US Army in 1945. Harry began his career in academia as an Associate at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, now the Rockefeller University, in New York. In 1951, he joined the faculty at Case Western Reserve, in Cleveland. Shortly after joining the faculty, he began his groundbreaking exploration of the Adenoviridae, his initial interest sparked by the epidemiology and pathology ofAcute Respiratory Disease (ARD) among new recruits in the armed forces. He demonstrated that certain adenovirus serotypes were the causative agents of atypical pneumonia, pharyngitis, and ARD, and he also demonstrated that in asymptomatic children, the virus was latent in the adenoids, prior to becoming infectious. These early investigations sparked a life-long interest in adenoviruses and the relationship between viral infection and pathology. In 1961, Harry was named Chairman of the Department of Microbiology at the University of Pennsylvania. During this phase of his scientific career, his laboratory began to focus on the viral structural proteins. His lab was among the first to isolate temperature sensitive mutants of type 5 adenovirus and this allowed the functional characterization of the viral capsid proteins. In parallel, biochemical approaches were applied to isolate the individual late viral gene products. Collectively, these efforts laid the foundation for understanding viral DNA packaging, capsid maturation in host cells, and changes in host cell transcription and translation during the course of a virus infection. As with many pioneers, Harry was closely associated with the development of an agreed upon terminology for a new field and a short paper in Virology established the universally accepted terms “hexon, penton, and fiber” for the major external capsid proteins.
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Obituary
From 1973 to 1985, Harry was the Chairman of the Department of Microbiology at Columbia University Hospital of Physicians a
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