Seventy years ago, speaking at an international cancer meeting in Madrid, Professor Eric "Dick" Boyland, who has died aged 97, began a process which led to a key discovery in molecular toxicology. He suggested that, as cancer-causing hydrocarbons were chemically inert, but often caused cancer tumours at sites far from their initial contact with the body, they must be converted - within the body - to more active compounds that initiated the process of carcinogenesis.
Boyland was a founding father of world molecular toxicology, and, in pushing the idea that inert chemicals are converted to "reactive intermediates"- which do the cancer damage - he anticipated findings by two decades.
He had started work at the research laboratories of the Cancer hospital (now the Royal Marsden) in October 1931. These laboratories were part of the institute for cancer research in west London. After the Madrid meeting, his group - which moved in 1939 to the nearby Chester Beatty research institute in west London - began studying the metabolism of numerous hydrocarbons. He remained at the Chester Beatty institute until his retirement in 1970.
This early work led to the seminal suggestion that certain specific metabolites were formed via a common intermediate, an arene oxide. The suggestion that arene oxides were key intermediates in hydrocarbon metabolism was made at least 20 years before they were successfully synthesised in 1964 by the Americans MS Newman and S Blum.
The synthesis of arene oxides by Newman and Blum allowed its application to other hydrocarbons. This led to the biological and chemical properties of arene oxides being established. These properties matched the requirements of a reactive intermediate - and Boyland's prophecy was fulfilled.
Boyland was born in Lime Grove, Manchester, the son of a cloth merchant on an extremely modest income, and educated at Manchester central high school. He graduated from Manchester College of Technology in applied chemistry, and became a technician at the British Alizarin Company, while studying chemistry, physics and mathematics through evening classes. After two years, a scholarship enabled him to return to the college full time. In his final year, he specialised in physiology and chemistry, graduating with first-class honours in 1926.
That same year he started research at Manchester University medical school. He won the Hill prize for his subsequent MSc, and then joined the Lister Institute, working with Walter Morgan on the chemistry of blood groups. He took a doctorate from London University in 1930, and then spent a year at the Kaiser Wilhelm medical institute, in Heidelberg.
Boyland loved Heidelberg, enjoying paintings, music and the theatre, and climbing in the mountains. It was while there that he met his future wife, the Cambridge-educated crystallographer, Margaret "Peg" Maurice. They married in England in September 1931, shortly before Boyland joined the Cancer hospital.
In the early 1950s, it became clear that certain workers in the dyestuff industry developed tumours of the urinary bladder following their exposure to aromatic amines, particularly 2-naphthylamine, benzidine and 4-xenylamine. This was investigated by Boyland and Don Manson. Again, the fact that tumours developed at an anatomical site distant from initial exposure suggested that metabolic conversion took place, and that the urinary-borne active metabolite was transferred to the bladder and released to initiate cancer. This led to the recognition of more than 20 metabolites from a single chemical.
Boyland also realised that cancer of the urinary tract occurred in patients who had not been exposed to industrial amines, and he argued that something must be working from within. It was soon revealed that elevated levels of the metabolites 3-hydroxykynurenine, and 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid were present in the urine of subjects suffering from the condition. These compounds, and some metabolites de-rived from industrial amines, were shown to be locally carcinogenic when implanted into the bladders of mice.
A nother of Boyland's interests was tobacco smoke as a cause of cancer. FJC Roe had already calculated that the concentrations of known carcinogens derived from tobacco were not enough to account for its carcinogenicity. Boyland suggested that "nitrosamines", derived from tobacco alkaloids, might be the causative agents.Unfortunately, the technology allowing their detection in tobacco smoke and biological systems was not available, and it was left to others to confirm Boyland's idea. However, he wrote a monograph on bladder cancer, and published extensively in scientific and medical journals. With Roy Goulding he edited the (unfortunately shortlived) Modern Trends In Toxicology.
On a personal level, he was a difficult person to get close to. Although he later mellowed, he was always impatient and seemed not to enjoy social interaction at the institute, wanting instead to get on with work. He was also singularly devoid of humour. This was in complete contrast to evenings at the Athenaeum, where he seemed to relax. His hobbies were hiking, climbing, sailing, the theatre and painting. He had an exhibition of his work at Chelsea, and was a keen collector, particularly of the English school connected with the Bloomsbury set.
In retirement, Boyland spent some time at the international agency for cancer research in Lyon, before accepting the professorship of toxicology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The department in which he worked closed in 1990, and I offered him an office at King's College, near his Chelsea home. These years still produced ideas, but removal from the stimulation of his laboratory and colleagues diminished his drive, and he turned to more sedate hobbies.
Along with his gift of generating ideas, his ability to choose colleagues at all levels was remarkable. When one remembers that their work was carried out without the benefit of modern equipment, one holds their skills in awe. Boyland received the Judd medal for cancer research and honorary degrees from Malta and Frankfurt universities. His failure to be recognised by the Royal Society, or to be given a civil honour, suggests that, not for the first time, his achieve- ments were overlooked because of his personality. His wife died in 1985; he leaves two sons and a daughter.
· Eric 'Dick' Boyland, scientist, born February 24 1905; died May 31 2002
