Japan, Order of the Rising Sun, Second Class, awarded to Sir Ernst Boris Chain in 1976,

comprising neck badge, in silver-gilt and enamels, including paulownia suspension, and breast star, in silver with gilt and enamelled centre, in a glazed frame, together with a bestowal document and a 'Patent of Decoration', both mounted and framed

48 x 36,cm, 38 x 31cm, 64 x 46cm

3

Provenance:

Being sold on behalf of the charity, Children With Hidden Disabilities.
Christies, 13 August 1998, lot 213.

Footnote:

The Order of the Rising Sun was established in 1875 and is awarded to people who have rendered distinguished service to the state in various fields.

Sir Ernst Boris Chain (1906-1979) was a German-born British biochemist who, with pathologist Howard Walter Florey, isolated and purified penicillin and performed the first clinical trials of the antibiotic. For their pioneering work on penicillin, Chain, Florey, and Fleming shared the 1945 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine. Chain and his co-workers concentrated on penicillin and showed that it was probably the most effective chemotherapeutic drug known, and that it was relatively non-toxic. This led to mass production of the drug, which has saved untold millions of lives.

Chain graduated in chemistry and physiology from the Friedrich Wilhelm University of Berlin and then engaged in research at the Institute of Pathology, Charité Hospital, Berlin (1930–33). Forced to flee Germany, he went first to the University of Cambridge, working under Sir Frederick G. Hopkins, and then (1935) to the University of Oxford, where he worked with Florey on penicillin.

Chain served as the director of the International Research Centre for Chemical Microbiology, Superior Institute of Health, Rome, from 1948 until 1961. He then joined the faculty of Imperial College, University of London, where he was professor of biochemistry (1961–73), professor emeritus and senior research fellow (1973–76), and fellow (1978–79). Chain was knighted in 1969.

Condition Report:

All appear in good overall condition. Framed and glazed.