Oliver H. Lowry

Who was Oliver H. Lowry?

Oliver Howe Lowry was an American biochemist. He is best remembered for devising the Lowry protein assay.

Lowry was the youngest of a family of five children. His father was a teacher and later an administrator in the Chicago public school system. His three brothers and sister all earned graduate degrees in various fields, and Lowry was inspired to emulate his siblings. He attended Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, for his undergraduate studies, having intended to major in chemical engineering. However, upon the advice of a fellow student, he ended up shifting his focus towards biochemistry. After graduating from Northwestern in 1932, he enrolled at the University of Chicago, where he sought to study "physiological chemistry". During his second year, a dean of the University offered Lowry admission to the university's MD/PhD program, which he accepted and from which he graduated in 1937. Despite the fact that he been granted the title of "Doctor of Medicine", Lowry never practiced medicine.

After graduating from the University of Chicago with his two doctoral degrees, Lowry failed in his attempt to secure a postdoctoral fellowship. He left Chicago to work at Harvard University under A. Baird Hastings. While at Harvard, Hastings was able to arrange for Lowry to work for five months at the Carlsberg Laboratory in Copenhagen, Denmark, where he worked with Kaj Ulrik Linderstrøm-Lang. By 1942, Otto Bessey persuaded his friend Lowry to join him at the newly established Public Health Research Institute in New York City, where Lowry would work until 1947.