Sarah Elizabeth Stewart (August 16, 1905 – November 27, 1976) was a Mexican-American researcher who pioneered the field of viral oncology research, and the first to show that cancer-causing viruses can spread from animal to animal. She and Bernice Eddy co-discovered the first

polyoma virus ''Polyomaviridae'' is a family of viruses whose natural hosts are primarily mammals and birds. As of 2020, there are six recognized genera and 117 species, five of which are unassigned to a genus. 14 species are known to infect humans, while othe ...

, and SE (Stewart-Eddy) polyoma virus is named after them.

Personal life and education

Early life

Sarah Elizabeth Stewart was born on August 16, 1905, in

Tecalitlán Tecalitlán is a city and municipality in the central Pacific coastal state of Jalisco, Mexico. Located just south of Ciudad Guzmán, its population was 16,705 as of 2020. Industry One of Tecalitlán's major industries was the growing of sugar c ...

, Jalisco,

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, to a Native Mexican mother and an American mining engineer father. Due to the Mexican Revolution, her and her family were asked to leave the country in 1911, forcing them to migrate to the United States. Stewart would continue to speak Spanish fluently throughout her lifetime. Stewart and her family lived in Cottage Grove, Oregon, where she completed her lower education.

Education

In 1927, she graduated with a Bachelors of Science and a degree in economics from

New Mexico State University New Mexico State University (NMSU or NM State) is a public land-grant research university based primarily in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Founded in 1888, it is the oldest public institution of higher education in New Mexico and one of the state's ...

. She went on to earn a master's degree from the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, ...

in 1930 and a

Ph.D A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

in microbiology from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chic ...

in 1939. Stewart worked as a professor of bacteriology at

Georgetown University School of Medicine Georgetown University School of Medicine, a medical school opened in 1851, is one of Georgetown University's five graduate schools. It is located on Reservoir Road in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, DC, adjacent to the University's ...

, which allowed her to take medical courses for free until women were allowed to formally enroll in the medical school in 1947. In 1949 at the age of 43, she became the first woman to be awarded an MD Degree from Georgetown University School of Medicine.Biography from gwis.org

Career

National Institutes of Health (NIH) and United States Public Health Service (USPHS)

Stewart joined the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

(NIH) as a bacteriologist from 1935 to 1944 while completing her PhD at the University of Chicago. She managed to publish 7 papers pertaining to anaerobic bacteria while she was completing her PhD. During her time at the NIH, she also took part in developing a vaccine for gangrene, which helped many soldiers during the

second world war World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. She later left her position in the NIH in order to pursue her goals in the research field as a commissioned officer of the

United States Public Health Service The United States Public Health Service (USPHS or PHS) is a collection of agencies of the Department of Health and Human Services concerned with public health, containing nine out of the department's twelve operating divisions. The Assistant ...

at the

National Cancer Institute The National Cancer Institute (NCI) coordinates the United States National Cancer Program and is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is one of eleven agencies that are part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ...

in 1951. Here Stewart aimed to prove that there was a connection between cancers and viruses.

Professional hurdles

Stewart's status as a woman in the medical field in the 1940s and 1950s came with additional challenges. When requesting to work on cancer research at the NIH, she was told she was not qualified to do so. After completing her medical degree, Stewart wrote a protocol for work on cancer-causing viruses and sent it to the director of the National Cancer Institute. Stewart instead was assigned to gynecology, as was many of the female doctors at the time. In addition, the two fields of cancer research and viruses were thought to be completely separate. This led to the common belief that virologists were not qualified to take part in cancer research, whereas microbiologists were thought to be overqualified. Despite these obstacles, Stewart continued to pursue her passion for cancer research and viruses, ultimately earning numerous achievements in her field.

Polyoma virus research

In 1951, Stewart was reassigned to the Marine Hospital in Baltimore where she finally was able to work in the field of cancer. Stewart is credited with discovering the

polyomavirus ''Polyomaviridae'' is a family of viruses whose natural hosts are primarily mammals and birds. As of 2020, there are six recognized genera and 117 species, five of which are unassigned to a genus. 14 species are known to infect humans, while othe ...

in 1953. In 1956, Stewart approached Bernice Eddy for assistance growing the agent causing parotid tumors in mice. Eddy readily agreed and the two women rapidly worked out the characteristics of the agent that was not referred to as a virus in their publications until 1959. Building on earlier work by

Ludwig Gross Ludwik Gross (September 11, 1904 – July 19, 1999) was a Polish-American virologist who discovered two different tumor viruses—murine leukemia virus and mouse polyomavirus—capable of causing cancers in laboratory mice. Biography Gross w ...

, Stewart and Bernice E. Eddy were the first to describe a polyomavirus. They did so by injecting the mice with ground organs of other mice that were known to contain leukemia, and observing cancerous tumor growth that was unrelated to leukemia. They satisfied

Koch's postulates Koch's postulates ( )"Koch"
''

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

to be transmitted from animal to animal. Although it has been demonstrated that SE polyoma virus produces tumors in rodents under laboratory conditions, it is known that the parotid gland tumors and others of the spectrum produced in mice rarely are found under natural conditions, even though it has been found that many mouse colonies have the virus as a latent infection. Stewart and Eddy continued to test the theory that viral components are able to induce tumors. They tested tumor extracts from both monkey and mouse embryos, and found that the mouse embryos contained a higher quantity of cancer causing viral agents. This lead them to reason that viruses can be causative agents of cancer. They also concluded that the polyomavirus was able to cause 20 different types of mouse tumors. Some of the tumors observed were angiomatous sarcomas in Syrian hamsters, sarcomas in rats, and mesenchymal nodules in rabbits. Eddy and Stewart demonstrated that the virus causes cell necrosis and proliferation in cell culture, that it is highly antigenic, and that it leads to formation of specific antibodies in infected animals whether or not tumors develop. At Eddy's suggestion, the virus was dubbed "polyoma," meaning many tumors. The virus was named the Stewart-Eddy or SE polyoma virus, after their respective surnames. The results of their collaboration earned them recognition by Time magazine in 1959, featuring a cover story on newly discovered viral agents that cause cancer. This experiment and its results, amongst other similar experiments, led many researchers to becoming interested in the field of viral oncology.

Ludwik Gross rivalry

In December 1952,

Ludwik Gross Ludwik Gross (September 11, 1904 – July 19, 1999) was a Polish-American virologist who discovered two different tumor viruses—murine leukemia virus and mouse polyomavirus—capable of causing cancers in laboratory mice. Biography Gross w ...

, a virologist, received a letter from Stewart as she had questions regarding Gross' research on the etiological agent of leukemia in mice. Stewart and Gross were both studying and researching on cancer-causing viruses concurrently and separately. They each seemed to be unaware of the other until December 1952 when Gross was contacted by Stewart. Stewart wrote to Gross as she was attempting to confirm Gross' work on the leukemia virus as her findings were different, she requested for Gross to send her some mice he was working on . Instead, Gross invited Stewart to his lab in New York in early 1953 to learn more about his research and pick up the mice she previously requested for. Stewart's first observation of the parotid tumor was in July 1952. She later presented her results at the AAAS meeting in December 1953 but was invalidated as her findings did not satisfy the Koch's postulate. Her unsuccess spurred new ideas which led her to propose a collaborative study with several people from the NCI and

NIH The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

, but that was an unsuccess as well. Unaware that Gross had already observed parotid tumors, Stewart deemed her discovery as uniquely her own. She thought that Gross had heard about the research through her when she visited his laboratory in New York. The conflict arose when Stewart and Gross admonished each other for failing to appropriately credit the other's paper. The rivalry came to a peak in 1958, when Jacob Furth attributed the discovery of the parotid tumor virus to both Stewart and Gross. The discovery of the parotid tumor virus was initially credited to both Gross and Stewart, and eventually the virus was named after Stewart and Eddy, now known as the "SE polyomavirus." Gross was infuriated, traditionally, the first scientist that finds a new discovery gets to name it. So, since Gross believed that he discovered the polyoma virus first during his initial experiments with the leukemia virus, he thought that he should've had the chance to name the virus. However, Stewart was also insistent that she discovered the virus first, during the summer of 1952 before she met Gross, and that her virus was produced under different conditions and different mouse strains than Gross's virus. Most organizations and researchers credited Stewart and Eddy for the finding, though Gross did not let his frustrations go unheard, leading him to write a number of letter to publishers. However, Eddy later admitted that Gross found the virus first, but she knew Stewart would never admit it.

Other research

Stewart helped to identify other viruses in her lifetime, such as herpes,

Burkitt's Burkitt lymphoma is a cancer of the lymphatic system, particularly B lymphocytes found in the germinal center. It is named after Denis Parsons Burkitt, the Irish surgeon who first described the disease in 1958 while working in equatorial Africa ...

and what are known as C-type viruses. C-type viruses are not as strong as A and B and typically effect people more mildly than others. However, it has occasionally been linked to the development of Leukemia. It became known that there were some viruses that could lead to or be a cause for certain cancers. Stewart developed an interest in researching these viral links to cancer in light of the pioneering research of

Jonas Salk Jonas Edward Salk (; born Jonas Salk; October 28, 1914June 23, 1995) was an American virologist and medical researcher who developed one of the first successful polio vaccines. He was born in New York City and attended the City College of New ...

in developing a vaccine for the virus which caused

polio Poliomyelitis, commonly shortened to polio, is an infectious disease caused by the poliovirus. Approximately 70% of cases are asymptomatic; mild symptoms which can occur include sore throat and fever; in a proportion of cases more severe s ...

Death and afterward

Stewart herself was diagnosed with the disease she spent her life researching, cancer. Beginning with ovarian cancer and then obtaining lung cancer which ultimately cost her her life. Long time colleague and friend Bernice Eddy said that Stewart continued to do work and more research until she unfortunately became too sick to work in 1974. She died in her home in New Smyrna Beach, Florida on November 27, 1976. Stewart was interred at the

Rock Creek Cemetery Rock Creek Cemetery is an cemetery with a natural and rolling landscape located at Rock Creek Church Road, NW, and Webster Street, NW, off Hawaii Avenue, NE, in the Petworth neighborhood of Washington, D.C., United States. It is across the stre ...

on the 23rd of May, 1977. Her memorial service was held at the Presbyterian Church in Bethesda, Maryland. Today, a collection of her papers is held at the

National Library of Medicine The United States National Library of Medicine (NLM), operated by the United States federal government, is the world's largest medical library. Located in Bethesda, Maryland, the NLM is an institute within the National Institutes of Health. Its ...

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which in ...

and are viewed by researchers, students, professors, health professionals and even the public to continue to learn more about her research and work.

Awards and honors

In 1965, Stewart was awarded the Federal Women's Award by President Lyndon B. Johnson as a US Public Health Service Commissioned Officer and for her scientific contributions to the study of viral etiologies of cancer. The purpose of the Federal Women's Award is to recognize women who are doing great works in the Federal Service and to express gratitude for their service. She also won the Lenghi Award of the

Accademia Nazionale Dei Lincei The Accademia dei Lincei (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed", but anglicised as the Lincean Academy) is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rom ...

in Rome and the Daughters of Penelope Salute to Women Award in 1972. The Daughters of Penelope Salute Award is to honor women who promote Hellenism, education, philanthropy, civic responsibility and family and individual excellence, which Stewart did with her research. She was also awarded the John Carroll Award in 1975. This award is given to Georgetown Alumni who, like Stewart, have achieved things that exemplify what Georgetown set their ideals and traditions to be. Besides all the honorary awards, Stewart and Dr. Bernice E. Eddy were also nominated twice for the Nobel Prize. Today, the Sarah Stewart Scholarship at the

(GUSOM) honors Dr. Sarah Stewart's pioneering achievements and research accomplishment by selecting incoming GUSOM students who demonstrate great potential for academic and research contributions, as well as the dedication to the ongoing study of the humane practice of medicine.

Published studies

# Stewart SE. Leukemia in mice produced by a filterable agent present in AKR leukemic tissues with notes on a sarcoma produced by the same agent bstract Anat Rec. 1953;117:532. # Stewart SE. Neoplasms in mice inoculated with cell-free extracts or filtrates of leukemic mouse tissue. I. Neoplasms of the parotid and adrenal glands. J Natl Cancer Inst. 1955;15:1391–415. # Eddy BE, Stewart SE, Stanton MF, Marcotte JM. Induction of tumors in rats by tissue-culture preparations of SE polyoma virus. J Natl Cancer Inst. 1959;22:161–71.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stewart, Sarah 1905 births 1976 deaths Cancer researchers Georgetown University School of Medicine alumni Mexican people of American descent Mexican emigrants to the United States New Mexico State University alumni University of Chicago alumni University of Massachusetts Amherst alumni American virologists 20th-century American physicians Hispanic and Latino American scientists 20th-century American women scientists Physicians from New Mexico 20th-century American women physicians Hispanic and Latino American women physicians Burials at Rock Creek Cemetery