Britton Chance

Britton Chance
Born	(1913-07-24)July 24, 1913 Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Died	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Nationality	United States
Alma mater	University of Pennsylvania Cambridge University
Known for	Enzyme kinetics Optical imaging MRI
Scientific career
Fields	Biophysics Biochemistry
Institutions	University of Pennsylvania

Olympic medal record
Men's Sailing
Representing United States
	Helsinki 1952	5.5 metre class

Britton Chance (born July 24, 1913) was the Eldridge Reeves Johnson Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry and Biophysics, as well as Professor Emeritus of Physical Chemistry and Radiological Physics at the School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania. He was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. He received a B.A. (1935), M.A. (1936) and Ph.D. degree in Physical Chemistry 1940 at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was a member of St. Anthony Hall. He earned a second Ph.D. at Cambridge University in 1942 in Biology/Physiology. In 1952 he received his D.Sc. from Cambridge. His research interests focused on the use of infrared light to characterize the properties of various tissues and breast tumors. He joined the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1952. Chance received the National Medal of Science in 1974. He was also previously elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Medical Sciences, in 1968, as well as a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (London) in 1981.

During World War II, Chance worked for the Radiation Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology which was working on the development of radar.

He won a gold medal for the United States at the 1952 Summer Olympics in the 5½ Meter Class, alongside Edgar White and Sumner White.

From 1995 he had been the President of the Medical Diagnostic Research Foundation (MDRF) in Philadelphia.

ISOTT established The Britton Chance Award in honor of Professor Chance's long-standing commitment, interest and contributions to the science and engineering aspects of oxygen transport to tissue and to the society. This award was first presented in 2004 during the annual conference of ISOTT in Bari, Italy.

Honorary degrees

• MDs from: Karolinska Institute (in 1962), University of Düsseldorf (1991),University of Buenos Aires (1993), University of Copenhagen (1995), Universita Degli Studi Di Roma "Tor Vergata" (1997).
• D.Sc. degrees from: Medical College of Ohio at Toledo in 1974, Semmelweis University in 1976, Hahnemann Medical College in 1977, University of Pennsylvania in 1985, University of Helsinki in 1990.

Awards

• John Price Wetherill Medal, in 1966
• Gold Medal for Distinguished Service to Medicine, College of Physcians, USA, in 1987.
• Gold Medal, Society of Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, USA, in 1988.
• SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering Fellow, 2007
• APS - American Physical Society - Fellow, 2007
• ICAS Distinguished Fellow
• ICAS Liberty Award Recipient
• Molecular Imaging Achievement Award from the Society for Molecular Imaging, USA, in 2008
• Gold Medal, 1952 Summer Olympics, Sailing 5.5 Meter Class.

External links

• http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1174734&lang=eng_news - Feb 6, 2010 Taiwan News
• http://zippy1300.blogspot.com/2010/02/i-see-by-snailpapers-that-britton.html - Feb. 12, 2010, Taiwan Blogger
• http://www.archives.upenn.edu/histy/people/1900s/chance_britton.html - A good biography of Britton Chance,PhD²
• http://www.icasinc.org/bios/chance.html - a long CV of Prof. Britton Chance
• Academic home page
• Kresge N, Simoni RD, Hill RL. Britton Chance: Olympian and Developer of Stop-Flow Methods. J. Biol. Chem., Vol. 279, Issue 50, 10, December 10, 2004.