Elvio Herbert Sadun (December 9, 1918 – April 23, 1974) was an Italian-American

parasitologist Parasitology is the study of parasites, their hosts, and the relationship between them. As a biological discipline, the scope of parasitology is not determined by the organism or environment in question but by their way of life. This means it f ...

. Educated at Harvard and Johns Hopkins University (ScD, zoology), he conducted most of his research as Chief of Medical Zoology at the

Walter Reed Army Institute of Research The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) is the largest biomedical research facility administered by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). The institute is centered at the Forest Glen Annex, in the Forest Glen Park part of the uni ...

(1959–1973). A prolific scientist, he wrote or edited 3 books and 313 peer-reviewed articles in the fields of immunology and tropical medicine, and is known for the first application of fluorescent antibody imaging in the diagnosis of parasitic diseases.

Life

Sadun was born in Livorno, Italy to a prominent Jewish family. As a Jew, Sadun escaped from Italy and immigrated to the U.S. in 1939 where he began graduate work in zoology at Harvard University. The outbreak of World War II brought him back to Italy with the US Army, and he became director of the Italian Radio Network under Allied Command, which would later become part of the

Armed Forces Network The American Forces Network (AFN) is a government television and radio broadcast service the U.S. military provides to those stationed or assigned overseas. Headquartered at Fort George G. Meade, Maryland, AFN's broadcast operations, which i ...

. This was a means for him to stay in constant communication with the

Italian partisans The Italian resistance movement (the ''Resistenza italiana'' and ''la Resistenza'') is an umbrella term for the Italian resistance groups who fought the occupying forces of Nazi Germany and the fascist collaborationists of the Italian Social ...

and allowed him to communicate secret instructions for the surrender of the Italian Navy in Malta.Wellard, James. "ITALIAN SURRENDER CHEERED IN MALTA." New York Times 13 Sept. 1943. Print. After the war, Sadun returned to Johns Hopkins and became a parasitologist. He married Lina Ottolenghi, another Italian Jewish refugee, in 1949. They had three children, Alfredo, Alberto, and Lorenzo, all of whom became university academics. In 1974, shortly after founding the

International Laboratory for Research on Animal Diseases The International Livestock Research Institute or ILRI is an international agricultural research institute within the CGIAR – formerly the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research. It was established in 1994 by merger of th ...

in Nairobi, he died from liver cancer in Washington, D.C. The Elvio Sadun Library at the

International Livestock Research Institute The International Livestock Research Institute or ILRI is an international agricultural research institute within the CGIAR – formerly the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research. It was established in 1994 by merger of t ...

Nairobi Nairobi ( ) is the capital and largest city of Kenya. The name is derived from the Maasai phrase ''Enkare Nairobi'', which translates to "place of cool waters", a reference to the Nairobi River which flows through the city. The city proper ha ...

is named in his honour.

Research

Sadun's major research was on the human immunologic reaction to parasitic diseases, or more precisely, host-parasite immunological interactions. Sadun made seminal contributions to the epidemiology of several parasitic diseases, immunodiagnostic methods, and was among the first to explore host-parasite relations.Paul P. Weinstein, "Elvio Herbert Sadun: 9 December 1918-23 April 1974". The Journal of Parasitology , Vol. 60, No. 6 (Dec., 1974), pp. 897-899 He also defined several epidemiological events and helped manage outbreaks of

Opisthorchis viverrini ''Opisthorchis viverrini'', common name Southeast Asian liver fluke, is a food-borne trematode parasite from the family Opisthorchiidae that infects the bile duct. People are infected after eating raw or undercooked fish. Infection with the par ...

in Thailand (1952–1953), of

Schistosomiasis Schistosomiasis, also known as snail fever, bilharzia, and Katayama fever, is a disease caused by parasitic flatworms called schistosomes. The urinary tract or the intestines may be infected. Symptoms include abdominal pain, diarrhea, bloody s ...

japonica in Japan (1957–1958), and of Schistosomiasis haematobia in Egypt (1970). In 1960, he and two other researchers were the first to apply a recently developed technique, fluorescent antibody imaging, to the diagnosis of schistosomiasis. Sadun held faculty positions at several universities before joining the

U.S. 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 ...

and later the

Centers for Disease Control The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency, under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgi ...

(CDC). He became Chief of Zoology at the

(WRAIR) where he conducted investigations in many areas of parasitology, and managed the US Malaria program. He helped to organize and fund, through WRAIR, a major program for basic and applied research in malaria in the mid 1960s which led to at least two effective antimalarial therapies.Sherman, Irwin W. Reflections on a Century of Malaria Biochemistry. London: Academic, 2008. p17. Print. In 1972 he organized, with support from the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations, a number of countries into a consortium to form a major new institute: The International Laboratory for Research on Animal Diseases (ILRAD) in Nairobi, Africa. Sadun became the founding director shortly before he died.

Awards

Sadun received four major medals for his research in parasitology and tropical medicine. In 1961 he received the Henry Baldwin Ward Medal,The Henry Baldwin Ward Medal, brief history and list of awardees, http://www.k-state.edu/parasitology/wardmedal.html the highest award of the American Society of Parasitologists.http://asp.unl.edu In 1968 he received the Department of the Army Decoration for Exceptional Civilian Service, in 1973 he received the Helminthological Society of Washington's Anniversary Award,http://www.helmsoc.org/anaward.html and in 1974 he was posthumously awarded the

Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award The Department of Defense Distinguished Civilian Service Award is the highest Awards and decorations of the United States government, civilian award given by the United States Department of Defense. This award and accompanying Distinguished Civilia ...

. In 1999, a tree was dedicated in his honor in the Jerusalem

Peace Forest Peace forest is a forest in South - Southeast Jerusalem, Israel, between the Abu Tor neighbourhood and the Sherover Promenade. The Peace Forest was planted on a site identified with the biblical Azal river mentioned in the book of Zechariah (Z ...

by Italian president

Carlo Azeglio Ciampi Carlo Azeglio Ciampi (; 9 December 1920 – 16 September 2016) was an Italian politician and banker who was the prime minister of Italy from 1993 to 1994 and the president of Italy from 1999 to 2006. Biography Education Ciampi was born i ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sadun, Elvio 1918 births 1974 deaths American parasitologists United States Army personnel United States Army personnel of World War II Harvard University alumni 20th-century American physicians