Joan Mary "Jan" Anderson

FAA The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...

FRS (13 May 1932 – 28 August 2015) was a New Zealand scientist who worked in Canberra, Australia, distinguished by her investigation of

photosynthesis Photosynthesis is a process used by plants and other organisms to convert light energy into chemical energy that, through cellular respiration, can later be released to fuel the organism's activities. Some of this chemical energy is stored i ...

Life

Joan Mary Anderson was born in 1932 in Queenstown, New Zealand. Her father Dr Bill Anderson was a country doctor. Her mother died, after a long illness, when Anderson was eight. Much to the disappointment of her father, who had wanted her to become a doctor, she studied organic chemistry at the

University of Otago , image_name = University of Otago Registry Building2.jpg , image_size = , caption = University clock tower , motto = la, Sapere aude , mottoeng = Dare to be wise , established = 1869; 152 years ago , type = Public research collegiate ...

. At the time, degrees were issued by the

University of New Zealand The University of New Zealand was New Zealand's sole degree-granting university from 1874 to 1961. It was a collegiate university embracing several constituent institutions at various locations around New Zealand. After it was dissolved in 196 ...

, and she obtained a

BSc A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...

and MSc with first class honours. She obtained a scholarship, the King George V Memorial Fellowship for New Zealand, that allowed her to undertake postgraduate studies in the United States for one year. When she arrived at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

, she found that her New Zealand postgraduate degree was not recognised, which denied her access to the library, research facilities, and health insurance. To overcome this problem, she enrolled for a PhD, which she studied towards at the

UC Berkeley College of Chemistry The UC Berkeley College of Chemistry is one of 14 schools and colleges at the University of California, Berkeley. It houses the departments of Chemistry, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Chemical Biology and occupies six buildings flan ...

(1956–59) under the supervision of

Melvin Calvin Melvin Ellis Calvin (April 8, 1912 – January 8, 1997) was an American biochemist known for discovering the Calvin cycle along with Andrew Benson and James Bassham, for which he was awarded the 1961 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He spent most of h ...

; Calvin received the

Nobel Prize in Chemistry ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...

in 1961. She then taught at Wellington Girls' High School under a bond, but broke this arrangement to take up a job offer with the

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency responsible for scientific research. CSIRO works with leading organisations around the world. From its headquarters in Canberra, CSIRO ...

(CSIRO) made to her four years earlier by John Falk of CSIRO Plant Industry. She was the first to show that the photosynthetic mechanism comprises two fundamental components: photosystem I and photosystem II. Anderson was an adjunct professor at the

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public research university located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton encompasses seven teaching and research colleges, in addition to several national academies an ...

. Anderson died on 28 August 2015. Her funeral was held at

St John the Baptist Church, Reid St John the Baptist Church is an Australian Anglican church in the Canberra suburb of Reid in the Australian Capital Territory. The church is located at the corner of Anzac Parade and Constitution Avenue, adjacent to the Parliamentary Triangl ...

, Canberra.

Awards and honors

She received many honors and awards for her work, including election as a

Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science The Fellowship of the Australian Academy of Science is made up of about 500 Australian scientists. Scientists judged by their peers to have made an exceptional contribution to knowledge in their field may be elected to Fellowship of the Academy ...

in 1987, and as a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathemat ...

in 1996.Horton, Peter; Soon Chow, Wah; Barret, Christopher (2018). "Joan Mary Anderson. 12 May 1932—28 August 2015". ''

Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society The ''Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society'' is an academic journal on the history of science published annually by the Royal Society. It publishes obituaries of Fellows of the Royal Society. It was established in 1932 as ''Obitua ...

''
doi.org/10.1098/rsbm.2018.0006
She was awarded an honorary doctorate from

Umeå University Umeå University ( sv, Umeå universitet; Ume Sami: ) is a public research university located in Umeå, in the mid-northern region of Sweden. The university was founded in 1965 and is the fifth oldest within Sweden's present borders. As of 2 ...

in 1998. She was awarded the Centenary Medal in 2001. In 2017, she was selected as one of the Royal Society of New Zealand's "

150 women in 150 words Fifteen or 15 may refer to: *15 (number), the natural number following 14 and preceding 16 *one of the years 15 BC, AD 15, 1915, 2015 Music * Fifteen (band), a punk rock band Albums * ''15'' (Buckcherry album), 2005 * ''15'' (Ani Lorak alb ...

References

External links

Resources from the Australian National Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Jan 1932 births 2015 deaths 20th-century British women scientists Academic staff of the Australian National University Fellows of the Australian Academy of Science Female Fellows of the Royal Society New Zealand biologists People from Queenstown, New Zealand People from Canberra Recipients of the Centenary Medal University of Otago alumni UC Berkeley College of Chemistry alumni Umeå University alumni