Jacques Francis Albert Pierre MillerACFRSFAA (born 2 April 1931) is a French-Australian research scientist. He is known for having discovered the function of the thymus and for the identification of mammalian species of the two major subsets of lymphocytes (T cells and B cells) and their function.
Miller studied medicine at the University of Sydney, and had his first experience of laboratory research in the laboratory of Professor Patrick de Burgh where he studied virus infection.[1]
In 1958, Miller travelled to the United Kingdom on a Gaggin Research Fellowship from the University of Queensland. He was accepted to the Chester Beatty Research Institute of Cancer Research (part of the Institute of Cancer Research, London) and as a PhD student at the University of London.[2] Miller chose to study the pathogenesis of lymphocytic leukemia in mice, expanding on the research of Ludwik Gross into murine leukemia virus. Miller showed that experimental animals without a thymus at birth were incapable of rejecting foreign tissues and resisting many infections, thus demonstrating that the thymus is vital for the development and function of the adaptive immune system. Prior to this, the thymus was believed to be a vestigial organ with no function.[3] His discovery has led many to describe Miller as the "world's only living person who can claim to have been the first to have described the functions of a human organ".[4] In 1963, Miller continued his work into the function of the thymus at the National Institutes of Health.
In 1966, Miller returned to Australia to become a research group leader at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical ResearchinMelbourne, at the invitation of its new director Sir Gustav Nossal, the successor of Sir Macfarlane Burnet. There, with student Graham Mitchell, he discovered that mammalian lymphocytes can be separated into what were later called T cells and B cells, and that these interact to allow normal antibody production (T cell help). Miller went on to show that the thymus produces the T cells, that it removes autoreactive T cells (central T cell tolerance) and several other landmark findings in immunology. These are considered crucial to understanding diseases such as cancer, autoimmunity and AIDS, as well as processes such as transplant rejection, allergy and antiviral immunity.[1] Miller was also the first to provide evidence that thymus-derived immune cells are important for the defense against certain tumors,[5] which forms the basis for modern cancer immunotherapy.
Semi-retired since 1996, Miller is still involved in immunological research.[4]
Miller has had a longstanding interest in art, and studied art in the 1980s. His art has been exhibited at venues in Melbourne.[6]
^Mellor, Lise (2008). "Miller, Jacques F A P". Faculty of Medicine Online Museum and Archive. The University of Sydney. Retrieved 12 February 2012.
^Miller, Jacques F. A. P. (July 2011). "The golden anniversary of the thymus". Nature Reviews Immunology. 11 (7): 489–495. doi:10.1038/nri2993. PMID21617694. S2CID21191923(Full text requires subscriber login or payment){{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
