Editing Howard Florey (section)

== Penicillin ==
{{main|History of penicillin}}

=== Development ===
In the course of his work on lysozyme, Chain read papers on the enzyme in the ''British Journal of Experimental Pathology'' by [[Alexander Fleming]] in volumes 3 and 8, and by Florey in volume 11. While doing so he came across Fleming's paper discussing the antibacterial effects of ''[[Penicillium notatum]]'' mould in volume 10. The erroneous impression given by Fleming that penicillin was a [[Bactericide|bactericidal]] enzyme led Chain to consider that it would be similar to lysozyme.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=281–283}} Money was short at the time; the office had an overdraft of £500 ({{Inflation|UK|500|1935|fmt=eq|r=-3|cursign=£}}) and Florey had to forbid the purchase of any further equipment. Chain and Florey decided to create a large research project on antibacterial substances produced by micro-organisms that could attract long-term funding.{{sfn|Chain|1971|p=297}} Three sources were initially chosen for investigation: ''[[Bacillus subtilis]]'', ''[[Trueperella pyogenes]]'' and [[penicillin]] mould.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=285}} Florey later said: 
{{blockquote|People sometimes think that I and the others worked on penicillin because we were interested in suffering humanity. I don't think it ever crossed our minds about suffering humanity. This was an interesting scientific exercise, and because it was of some use in medicine is very gratifying, but this was not the reason that we started working on it.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/exhib/nobel/florey.htm |title=Howard Walter Florey |last1=Sutherland |first1=Denise |last2=Tenkate |first2=Elissa |date=1998-02-19 |work=Australian Nobel Laureates |publisher=[[University of Melbourne]] |access-date=21 February 2019 |archive-date=24 March 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190324145611/http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/exhib/nobel/florey.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>}}

Florey approached the MRC for funding in September 1939, shortly after the outbreak of the [[Second World War]], and Mellanby authorised the project, allocating £250 ({{Inflation|UK|250|1939|fmt=eq|cursign=£}}) to launch the project, with £300 for salaries and £100 for expenses per annum for three years.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=300–303}} Florey felt that more would be required. On 1 November 1939, Henry M. "Dusty" Miller, Jr, from the Natural Sciences Division of the Rockefeller Foundation dropped by to discuss funding Heatley's position. Heatley had fallen out with Chain, and had accepted a new position at the [[Carlsberg Laboratory]] in [[Copenhagen]] on a Rockefeller Fellowship, but due to the outbreak of the [[Second World War]], he had decided to remain at Oxford. Miller arranged for Heatley to retain his fellowship. Instead of working for Chain, Heatley would report directly to Florey as his personal research assistant.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=300–303}}{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=119–121}}

[[File:Penicillin development (43818514272).jpg|thumb|left|[[Blue plaque]] commemorating the isolation and purification of penicillin at the [[Sir William Dunn School of Pathology]] in Oxford]]
As a bacteriologist, Miller was enthusiastic about the antibacterial project; he encouraged Florey to apply for a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, and recommended to his headquarters that the request for financial support be given serious consideration.{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=119–121}}{{sfn|Jonas|1989|pp=267–268}} "The work proposed", Florey wrote in his application letter, "in addition to its theoretical importance, may have practical value for therapeutic purposes."{{sfn|Jonas|1989|p=269}} Florey's application was approved, with the Rockefeller Foundation allocating US$5,000 (£1,250) per annum for five years.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=300–303}}{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=119–121}}

Florey's team already had a sample of penicillin mould; Dreyer had been given a sample of the mould in 1930 for his work on [[bacteriophage]]s. He had lost interest in penicillin when he discovered that it was not a bacteriophage, but Campbell-Renton had continued to cultivate it.{{sfn|Hobby|1985|pp=64–65}}{{sfn|Wilson|1976|p=156}} The team developed techniques for growing the mould on a surface of liquid [[Czapek-Dox medium]]. Most laboratory containers did not provide a large, flat area, so glass bottles laid on their sides were used.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=306–307}} Later, specially-made containers were fabricated.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=316}} As the laboratory gradually became a penicillin factory, Florey hired six women to perform the cultivation and extraction work.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=325}} It had to be carried out under sterile conditions;{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=325}} Abraham and Chain discovered that some airborne bacteria produced [[penicillinase]], an enzyme that destroys penicillin.<ref>{{cite journal | title=An Enzyme from Bacteria Able to Destroy Penicillin |last1=Abraham |first1=E. P. |author-link=Edward Abraham |last2=Chain |first2=E. |author-link2=Ernst Chain |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]] |issn=0028-0836 |year=1940 | volume=46 |page=837 |doi=10.1038/146837a0 |issue=3713 |bibcode=1940Natur.146..837A |s2cid=4070796 |doi-access=free }}</ref>

Heatley and Chain tackled the problem of how penicillin could be extracted from the mould. The liquid was filtered through parachute silk to remove the [[mycelium]], [[spore]]s and other solid debris.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=305–308}} The [[pH]] was lowered by the addition of [[phosphoric acid]] and the liquid was then cooled.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Abraham |first1=E. P. |author-link1=Edward Abraham |last2=Chain |first2=E. |author-link2=Ernst Chain |last3=Fletcher |first3=C. M. |last4=Florey |first4=H. W. |author-link4=Howard Florey |last5=Gardner |first5=A. D. |author-link5=Arthur Duncan Gardner |last6=Heatley |first6=N. G. |author-link6=Norman Heatley |last7=Jennings |first7=M. A. |author-link7=Margaret Jennings (scientist) |date=16 August 1941 |title=Further Observations on Penicillin |journal=[[The Lancet]] |issn=0031-6970 |volume=238 |issue=6,155 |pages=177–189 |doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(00)72122-2 |pmid=1541313}}</ref> In this form the penicillin could be drawn off by a solvent. Initially [[diethyl ether]] was used,{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=305–308}}{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=122–123}}  but it is highly inflammable.<ref>{{cite web |title=Research School of Chemistry Safety Regulations |date=July 2011 |publisher=Australian National University |url=http://rsc.anu.edu.au/~perri/RSC_Web/RSC%20Safety%20Regulations%20July%202011.pdf |access-date=7 July 2023 |archive-date=12 July 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120712175122/http://rsc.anu.edu.au/~perri/RSC_Web/RSC%20Safety%20Regulations%20July%202011.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> At Chain's suggestion, they tried the much less flammable [[amyl acetate]], and found that it also worked. Penicillin-bearing solvent was easily separated, but now they encountered the problem that had stymied earlier attempts: recovering the penicillin from the solvent. Heatley reasoned that if the penicillin could pass from water to solvent when the solution was [[acid]]ic, maybe it would pass back again if the solution was [[alkaline]]. Florey told him to give it a try. This method, which Heatley called "reverse extraction", was found to work.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=305–308}}{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=69–70}}{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=122–123}} Chain hit upon the idea of [[freeze drying]] to enable the water to be removed without damaging the penicillin. The team had thus developed a complete process for growing, extracting and purifying penicillin, resulting in a dry, brown powder.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=305–308}}{{sfn|Wilson|1976|pp=158–159}} By early 1942, they could prepare a highly purified compound,<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Abraham |first1=E. P. |last2=Chain |first2=E. |date=1942 |title=Purification of Penicillin |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]] |issn=0028-0836 |volume=149 |issue=3,777 |pages=328 |doi=10.1038/149328b0 |bibcode=1942Natur.149..328A |s2cid=4122059|doi-access=free }}</ref> and had proposed the chemical formula.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Abraham |first1=E. P. |author-link=Edward Abraham |last2=Baker |first2=W. |last3=Chain |first3=E. |author-link3=Ernst Chain |last4=Florey |first4=H. W. |author-link4=Howard Florey |last5=Holiday |first5=E. R. |last6=Robinson |first6=R. |date=1942 |title=Nitrogenous Character of Penicillin |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]] |issn=0028-0836 |volume=149 |issue=3,778 |page=356 |doi=10.1038/149356a0 |bibcode=1942Natur.149..356A |s2cid=4055617|doi-access=free }}</ref> Heatley developed an assay method. An Oxford unit was defined as the purity required to produce a 25&nbsp;mm bacteria-free ring.{{sfn|Sheehan|1982|p=30}} It was an arbitrary measurement, as the chemistry of penicillin was not yet known; the first research was conducted with solutions containing four or five Oxford units per milligram. Later, highly pure penicillin became available with 2,000 Oxford units per milligram.{{sfn|Williams|1984|p=99}}
[[File:Penicillin Past, Present and Future- the Development and Production of Penicillin, England, 1943 D16965.jpg|thumb|right|A laboratory worker sprays a solution containing penicillin mould into flasks of [[corn steep liquor]] to encourage further penicillin growth.]]

The team discovered that ''Penicillium'' extract killed several types of bacteria. Gardner and Orr-Ewing tested it against [[gonococcus|gonococci]] (against which it was most effective), ''[[meningococcus|meningococci]]'', ''[[streptococcus|streptococci]]'', ''[[staphylococcus|staphylococci]]'', [[anthrax bacteria]], ''[[Actinomyces]]'' and the organisms that caused [[tetanus]] and [[gangrene]]. Florey and Jennings experimented on rats, mice, rabbits and cats in which penicillin was administered in various ways,{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=308–312}} and found no evidence of toxicity.{{sfn|Sheehan|1982|p=32}} On 25 May 1940, Florey injected eight mice with a virulent strain of ''streptococcus'', and then four of them with penicillin. A day later all four of the untreated mice were dead, but all of the treated ones were still alive, although one died two days later.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=313–316}} Over the following weeks Jennings and Florey repeated the experiment with ever-larger batches of mice, and with different bacteria. They found that penicillin was also effective against ''staphylococci'' and the bacteria that cause gangrene.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=319–320}} They published their findings in ''[[The Lancet]]'' on 24 August 1940.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Chain |first1=E. |author-link1=Ernst Chain |last2=Florey |first2=H. W. |author-link2=Howard Florey |last3=Adelaide |first3=M. B. |last4=Gardner |first4=A. D. |author-link4=Arthur Duncan Gardner |last5=Heatley |first5=N. G. |author-link5=Norman Heatley |last6=Jennings |first6=M. A. |author-link6=Margaret Jennings (scientist) |last7=Orr-Ewing |first7=J. |last8=Sanders |first8=A. G. |date=1940 |title=Penicillin as a Chemotherapeutic agent |url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8403666 |journal=[[The Lancet]] |issn=0140-6736 |volume=236 |issue=6104 |pages=226–228 |doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(01)08728-1 |pmid=8403666 |access-date=8 February 2023 |archive-date=31 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211031222612/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8403666/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Florey reminded his staff that as promising as their results were, a man weighed 3,000 times as much as a mouse.{{sfn|Mason|2022|p=152}}

In February 1941, Florey and Chain treated their first patient, [[Albert Alexander (police officer)|Albert Alexander]], who had had a small sore at the corner of his mouth, which then spread, leading to a severe facial infection involving ''streptococci'' and ''staphylococci''. His whole face, eyes and scalp were swollen to the extent that he had had an eye removed to relieve the pain. Within a day of being given penicillin, he started to recover. However, the researchers did not have enough penicillin to help him to a full recovery, and he relapsed and died. Because of this experience and the difficulty in producing sufficient penicillin, Florey switched his focus to children, who could be treated with smaller quantities of penicillin.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=330–331}}

Florey expected that penicillin would be hailed as a breakthrough, but he was disappointed; his results aroused little interest. He spent the next two years attempting to generate interest in what he believed to be the most important medical discovery of the century.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=322}} He was elected a [[Fellow of the Royal Society]] in March 1941,{{sfn|Williams|1984|p=128}}<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article74465805 |title=Out Among the People |newspaper=[[The Advertiser (Adelaide)]] |location=South Australia |date=5 June 1941 |access-date=9 February 2023 |page=15 |via=National Library of Australia |archive-date=25 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231025104213/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/74465805 |url-status=live }}</ref> but his work with penicillin played little part in this.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=346}}

===North American supply===
As the war intensified with German air raids on the UK, Florey and Ethel decided to send their children away to a safer country in July 1940. The United States was not yet at war, and [[John Farquhar Fulton|John Fulton]], the [[Sterling Professor]] of [[Physiology]] at [[Yale University]], and his wife Lucia agreed to care for them at their home in [[New Haven, Connecticut]], "for the duration".{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=320–321}} In April 1941, the Rockefeller Foundation's [[Warren Weaver]] met with Florey, and they discussed the difficulty of producing sufficient penicillin to conduct clinical trials. Weaver arranged for the foundation to fund a three-month visit to the United States for Florey and a colleague so they could explore the possibility of the production of penicillin there.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=125–128}}

Since his aim was to persuade a firm to manufacture penicillin, and Heatley knew the most about penicillin production, Florey chose to take Heatley with him, and did not tell Chain until the morning of their departure. Chain, who saw penicillin as a joint project between himself and Florey, with Heatley as a laboratory technician, was greatly offended.{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=196–197}}  Chain later wrote: "I left the room silently but shattered by the experience of this underhand trick and act of bad faith, the worst so far in my experience of Florey. It spoiled my initially good relations with this man for ever."{{sfn|Clark|1985|p=68}}

Florey and Heatley left for the United States by air on 27 June 1941. In New Haven Florey met Fulton and was reunited with his children. Fulton introduced him to [[Ross Granville Harrison|Ross Harrison]], the Chairman of the [[National Research Council (United States)|National Research Council]], and Harrison introduced him to [[Charles Thom]], the chief [[mycologist]] at the [[Bureau of Plant Industry (United States)|Bureau of Plant Industry]] of the [[United States Department of Agriculture]] (USDA), and the man who had identified the mould reported by Fleming. Thom took them to [[Washington, D.C.]], to see Percy Wells, the acting head of the USDA's four laboratories, and Wells sent them to Orville May, the director of the UDSA's [[Northern Regional Research Laboratory]] (NRRL) in [[Peoria, Illinois]]. May arranged for them to meet with Robert D. Coghill, the chief of the NRRL's [[industrial fermentation|fermentation]] division, who raised the possibility that fermentation in large vessels (deep submergence) might be the key to large-scale production.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=130–134}}<ref>{{cite journal |title=Some Aspects of the Early History of Penicillin in the United States |first=Percy A. |last=Wells |journal=Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences |issn=0043-0439 |volume=65 |issue=3 |date=September 1975 |pages=96–101 |jstor=24536802 }}</ref>

On 17 August, Florey met with Richards, who had become the chairman of the Medical Research Committee of the [[Office of Scientific Research and Development]], who promised his support. Florey returned to Oxford in September without undertakings to produce the kilogram quantities of penicillin required for clinical trials,{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=134–137}} but the Japanese [[attack on Pearl Harbor]] in December 1941 brought the United States into the war and infused a new urgency into penicillin production.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=134–137}}

Chain suggested applying for a [[patent]] on the penicillin process. His motivation was not potential profits, but the danger of it being patented elsewhere. Florey took up the issue with Sir [[Henry Hallett Dale|Henry Dale]], the chairman of the [[Wellcome Trust]] and a member of the Scientific Advisory Panel to the [[Cabinet of the United Kingdom|British Cabinet]], and John William Trevan, the director of the Wellcome Trust Research Laboratory, but they were adamantly opposed, as they considered the notion of researchers profiting from their work as unethical. The Americans had no such scruples, and took out patents on the deep submergence processes they developed.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=336}}{{sfn|Williams|1984|p=129}} Chain regarded Florey as naive for not patenting the penicillin production process.{{sfn|Mason|2022|p=319}}

===Clinical trials===
In addition to the increased production at the Dunn School, commercial production from a [[pilot plant]] established by [[Imperial Chemical Industries]] became available in January 1942, and Kembel, Bishop and Company delivered its first batch of {{convert|200|impgal|L}} on 11 September. Florey conducted a second series of clinical trials. Ethel was placed in charge, but while Florey was a consulting pathologist at Oxford hospitals and therefore entitled to use their wards and services, Ethel, to his annoyance, was accredited merely as his assistant. Doctors tended to refer patients to the trial who were in desperate circumstances rather than those who were the most suitable candidates for treatment, but when penicillin did succeed anyway, confidence in its efficacy rose.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|pp=342–346}}

Harry Lambert, a friend of Fleming's dying from a meningococcal infection, became the twelfth case on 5 August 1942. He survived, but someone at [[St Mary's Hospital, London|St. Mary's Hospital]] leaked the result to the press, resulting in an editorial in ''[[The Times]]'' on 27 August. Florey was appalled; this could only create a public demand for penicillin when all available supplies were needed for the clinical trials. On 25 September, Florey met with Sir Cecil McAlpine Weir, the Director-General of Equipment and Stores at the [[Ministry of Supply]], who promised overriding priority for the mass production of penicillin.{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=273–276}}<ref>{{cite ODNB |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/36816 |title=Weir, Sir Cecil McAlpine (1890–1960) }}</ref> Ethel and Howard Florey published the results of clinical trials of 187 cases of treatment with penicillin in ''The Lancet'' on 27 March 1943.<ref>{{cite journal |first1=M.E. |last1=Florey |author-link=Mary Ethel Florey |title=General and Local Administration Of Penicillin |journal=[[The Lancet]] |issn=0140-6736 |volume=241 |issue=6239 |pages=387–397 |date=27 March 1943 |doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(00)41962-8}}</ref>

===North Africa===
The Medical Research Council decided that the time had come for field trials of penicillin. The location of centres to receive the drug was kept secret so as to not provoke demand for the drug when it was still in short supply.{{sfn|Hobby|1985|pp=122–124}} Florey was asked to go to North Africa, where the [[North African campaign]] was ongoing. He travelled to [[Algiers]] on the hospital ship {{HMHS|Newfoundland||6}} in May 1943. On 29 June he was joined by [[Hugh Cairns (surgeon)|Hugh Cairns]], another Rhodes Scholar from Adelaide, who now held the rank of [[brigadier]] in the British Army, and was in charge of [[St Hugh's College, Oxford#Second World War|St Hugh's Military Hospital (Head Injuries)]] in Oxford, who brought with him a stockpile of 40 million Oxford units of penicillin. Florey resisted well-intentioned efforts by the [[War Office]] to grant him military rank.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=177–179}}<ref>{{cite web |title=Sir Hugh Cairns, KBE |publisher=South Australian Government |work=Adelaidia |url=https://adelaidia.history.sa.gov.au/people/sir-hugh-cairns-kbe |access-date=14 February 2023 |archive-date=14 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230214210606/https://adelaidia.history.sa.gov.au/people/sir-hugh-cairns-kbe |url-status=live }}</ref>

Over the next two months Florey and Cairns flew back and forth between Algiers, [[Sousse]] and [[Tripoli, Libya|Tripoli]], with a week in [[Cairo]]. They treated over one hundred cases and compiled a report that ran to over one hundred pages. He gave lectures on penicillin, and his report contained recommendations for training of medical officers in its use. The fighting in North Africa ended in May 1943, so most of the cases Florey saw were not recently wounded soldiers, but ones with old wounds that had not healed; battle casualties began arriving again after the [[Allied invasion of Sicily]] in July. He considered that the source of infection in many cases was from the hospital rather than the battlefield, and advocated changes to the way that patients were treated to take advantage of the properties of penicillin. He argued that wounds should be cleaned and sealed up promptly. This was a radical idea; normally this would have been inviting [[gas gangrene]], but Florey proposed leaving that to the penicillin. His recommendations were acted upon, and the War Office established a training course for pathologists and clinicians at the [[Royal Herbert Hospital]], which made use of film that Florey shot in North Africa.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=177–182}}

Although he intended that penicillin be used to treat the seriously wounded, there were large numbers of [[venereal disease]] cases, against which penicillin was particularly effective, and from a military point of view being able to cure [[gonorrhea]] in 48 hours was a breakthrough. The supply situation improved, and 20 million units per day were made available for the [[Allied invasion of Italy]] in September. Two out of three gas gangrene casualties now survived.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=177–182}}{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=279–280}}

===Soviet Union===
One result of the [[Tehran Conference]] in November 1943 was an invitation for an Anglo-American scientific mission to visit the Soviet Union. The British team consisted of Florey and Sanders; the American of [[Albert Baird Hastings]] and [[Michael Boris Shimkin]]. After a month's travel via North Africa and Iran, they reached Moscow on 23 January 1944, where they met Soviet microbiologist [[Zinaida Yermolyeva]]. Florey gave her samples of penicillin, and she gave him a sample of the antibiotic [[Gramicidin S]].{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=185–190}} He arrived back at Oxford on 29 March 1944.{{sfn|Mason|2022|p=283}}

===Australia===
[[File:Howard_Florey_with_sister_Hilda_on_arrival_in_Melbourne,_1944.jpg|thumb|right|upright|Florey with his sister [[Hilda Gardner]] on arrival in Melbourne in 1944]]
In May 1944, the [[Prime Minister of Australia|Prime Minister]], [[John Curtin]] and the Commander-in-Chief of the Australian Army, [[General (Australia)|General]] Sir [[Thomas Blamey]], visited London for the [[1944 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference]]. At Blamey's request, Curtin asked Florey if he would visit Australia as an advisor on the use of penicillin.<ref>{{cite web |title=Production of Penicillin In Australia – Proposed visit of Professor Florey |id=A5954 472/16 |url=https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=640487 |access-date=18 February 2022 |archive-date=18 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230218043717/https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=640487 |url-status=live }}</ref>{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=190–192}} Florey arrived in Australia in August 1944 to a hero's welcome,<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17918431 |title=Sir Howard Florey in Pacific Area |newspaper=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]] |issue=33,282 |date=25 August 1944 |accessdate=18 February 2023 |page=4 |via=National Library of Australia |archive-date=25 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231025104719/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/17918431 |url-status=live }}</ref>{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=283–284}}{{sfn|Bickel|1995|pp=230–231}} and was awarded the degree of [[Doctor of Medicine]] (MD) by the University of Adelaide.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article43220191 |title=Sir Howard Florey Here On September 25 |newspaper=[[The Advertiser (Adelaide)|The Advertiser]] |volume=LXXXVII |issue=26817 |location=South Australia |date=14 September 1944 |accessdate=18 February 2023 |page=6 |via=National Library of Australia |archive-date=25 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231025104720/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/43220191 |url-status=live }}</ref>

In accepting the degree, he recapitulated his own career, and spoke about the need to make it easier for research to be conducted in Australia.{{sfn|Mason|2022|pp=285–286}} Florey met with Blamey; the two men got along well and chatted for several hours. It ended with Blamey convinced that Florey was the man to head a project Blamey had in mind: a medical research institute in [[Canberra]], the national capital. Blamey put his proposal to Curtin on 24 October. It was quickly approved, but Curtin became ill, and he died in July 1945.{{sfn|Williams|1984|pp=224–225}}

Florey discovered that penicillin production was already underway in Australia at the [[Commonwealth Serum Laboratories]] (CSL) in Melbourne. In 1943, the [[War Cabinet#Australia|War Cabinet]] had agreed to produce penicillin in Australia, and Colonel [[Esmond Venner Keogh|E. V. (Bill) Keogh]], the Army's Director of Hygiene and Pathology,  detailed Captain [[Percival Bazeley]] and Lieutenant H. H. Kretchmar to establish a production facility. They visited Peoria, and obtained penicillin cultures from Coghill. The first Australian-made penicillin began reaching the troops in New Guinea in December 1943.{{sfn|Bickel|1995|pp=224–230}}{{sfn|Matthews|2008|pp=323–324}} Florey was full of praise for their achievement, but disturbed that they had turned to the Americans for advice instead of him. "Am I not Australian?" he asked Keogh, "Have I not had some leading role in this thing?"{{sfn|Bickel|1995|p=231}}

=== Recognition ===
[[File:Penicillin-plaque-oxford.jpg|thumb|left|upright|Commemorative plaque outside the Botanic Gardens, Oxford|alt=The inscription reads: This rose garden was given in honour of the research workers in this university who discovered the clinical importance of penicillin. For saving of life, relief of suffering and inspiration to further research all mankind is in their debt. Those who did this work were E. P. Abraham, E. Chain, C. M. Fletcher, H. W. Florey, M. E. Florey, A. D. Gardner, N. G. Heatley, M. A. Jennings, J. Orr-Ewing, A. G. Sanders. Presented by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation New York June 1953]]
Florey returned to the UK in October 1944,{{sfn|Bickel|1995|p=235}} collecting his children from Fulton while en route.{{sfn|Williams|1984|p=225}} He was created a [[Knight Bachelor]] on 8 June 1944, and [[investiture|invested]] by King [[George VI]] at [[Buckingham Palace]] on 4 July 1944.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=36620 |date=21 July 1944 |page=3416 }}</ref> He shared the [[Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine]] in 1945 with Ernst Boris Chain and Alexander Fleming.<ref name="Nobel">{{Nobelprize|name=Sir Howard Florey}} including the 11 December 1945 Nobel Lecture ''Penicillin''</ref> Fleming first observed the antibiotic properties of the mould that makes penicillin, but it was Chain and Florey who developed it into a useful treatment.<ref>{{cite news |title=No Nobel Prize for Whining |last=Judson |first=Horace Freeland |author-link=Horace Freeland Judson |date=20 October 2003 |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/20/opinion/no-nobel-prize-for-whining.html?sec=health |access-date=23 June 2010 |archive-date=6 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180906201431/https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/20/opinion/no-nobel-prize-for-whining.html?sec=health |url-status=live }}</ref> Florey maintained that the penicillin project was originally driven by scientific interests, and that the medicinal discovery was a bonus.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/exhib/journal/as_florey.htm |work=Australasian Science |publisher=University of Melbourne |title=Howard Florey |first=Denise |last=Sutherland |date=28 January 1998 |access-date=21 February 2019 |archive-date=29 April 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190429060231/http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/exhib/journal/as_florey.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> The neuroscientist [[W. Maxwell Cowan]] observed that: {{blockquote|Fleming was the first person Florey saved. Without Florey's work he would have gone down as a somewhat eccentric microbiologist.{{sfn|Lax|2015|p=251}} }}

Florey always insisted that the development of penicillin was a team effort and that he received more credit than he deserved, but the team itself was his creation.{{sfn|Macfarlane|1979|p=357}} The philanthropist [[William Morris, 1st Viscount Nuffield|Lord Nuffield]] offered Florey £50,000 ({{Inflation|UK|50000|1945|fmt=eq|cursign=£|r=-3}}) as a personal gift; Florey asked him instead to use it to establish research fellowships at the Sir William Dunn School. The first beneficiaries included Abraham, Heatley and Sanders. When the [[Lasker Foundation|Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation]] asked if it could reward him, as it had the staff at Peoria, he arranged for a commemorative rose garden with a memorial stone honouring Abraham, Chain, Fletcher, himself, Ethel Florey, Gardner, Jennings, Orr-Ewing and Sanders.{{sfn|Bickel|1995|pp=250–251}}