science

Philip Herries Gregory

Philip Herries Gregory is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Philip Herries Gregory rather than just read about it. In short: Philip Herries Gregory (24 July 1907 in Exmouth, Devon, UK – 9 February 1986) was a British mycologist and phytopathologist. He established an international reputation as a pioneer of aerobiology and a leading expert on the liberation and dispersal of fungal spores and their relation to plant diseases and to human respiratory diseases.

Key takeaways

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Reproduce the core statement of Philip Herries Gregory from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Philip Herries Gregory (24 July 1907 in Exmouth, Devon, UK – 9 February 1986) was a British mycologist and phytopathologist. He established an international reputation as a pioneer of aerobiology and a leading expert on the liberation and dispersal of fungal spores and their relation to plant diseases and to human respiratory diseases. In 1957 he was elected to a one-year term as president of the British Mycological Society.

Biography During childhood, as a result of severe asthma which prevented him from regular school attendance, Philip H. Gregory had an erratic early education. At age 14 his asthma moderated and he became an enthusiast of outdoor excursions, meteorology, and natural history. Gregory graduated in 1928 from Brighton Technical College with a B.Sc. (General) degree in botany, chemistry, and zoology. Supported by a Royal Scholarship, he completed the final year of the B.Sc. (Special) degree course in botany at London's Imperial College of Science and Technology. There he did research in botany under the supervision of the plant pathologist William Brown and graduated with a Ph.D. on Fusarium disease in the genus Narcissus. and a D.I.C. In 1931 George Herbert Pethybridge, a Ph.D. examiner for Gregory, recommended him to Arthur Henry Reginald Buller. The outstanding mycologist Buller had a remarkable research team and was searching for a medical mycologist to work with Andrew M. Davidson, a dermatologist and lecturer at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Gregory worked with Davidson in Winnipeg for about 3 years from the end of 1931 to the end of 1934 and they coauthored several papers. In 1932 in Winnipeg, Gregory married Margaret F. Culverhouse; they became engaged three years earlier in London. In early 1935 Philip and Margaret Gregory returned to England. From 1935 to 1940 Gregory did research on flower bulb diseases of Narcissus and other species at Seale-Hayne College (an agricultural college near Newton Abbot). From 1935 to 1939 he did all of his fieldwork west of Truro and mostly in the Isles of Scilly. From 1940 to 1953 he was employed at the Rothamsted Experimental Station (now called Rothamsted Research) and worked on potato leafroll virus (PLRV) and potato virus Y (PVY). His research team established that aphids spread viral diseases of potato. During WW II he served as an air raid warden and during nights on duty he read scientific literature relevant to his research. He found a 56-page paper on dissemination of infectious diseases of plants by air currents, published by Konstantin Mikhailovich Stepanov in 1935 in Russian. Gregory thereupon learned Russian from phonograph records which he purchased with money received from selling his grandfather's gold watch. With help from his wife Margaret, he published in 1945 an important formula, which became a classic. (The formula was subsequently extended by A. C. Chamberlain.) Gregory became interested in the production of penicillin by Penicillium chrysogenum Thom (then known as P. notatum Westling) and took a one-year secondment to work at Imperial Chemical Industries, Ltd., Biological Laboratories, Manchester. In 1948 Gregory published a multiple infection transformation, which is now often used. In 1951 Gregory, in collaboration with S. Waller, introduced the genus Cryptostroma. In 1953 Gregory resigned his position as assistant director of Rothamsted's plant pathology laboratory to become a professor in the chair of botany at Imperial College London. He conducted his research at the Chelsea Physic Garden. In 1958 Gregory returned to Rothamsted as head of the plant pathology department. For some years he collaborated with Professor Jack Pepys, M.D. at the Institute of Diseases of the Chest (now the National Heart and Lung Institute). In 1967 Gregory retired, suffering from health problems. After a brief stay in hospital, his health improved and he became an international consultant on diseases of Theobroma cocoa. Gregory's research on spore dispersal and disease gradients, along with the work of J. E. Van Der Plank Jr., provided the theoretical basis for much research on phytopathological epidemiology and forecasting, as well as sampling of spores and other airborne particles. Gregory was a leading expert on aerobiology related to fungal spores, but he also did important research on "dermatophytes, flowering bulbs, the spread of potato viruses, human allergy and cocoa diseases". London University awarded Gregory the D.Sc. degree in 1949. In 1962 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. He was the president of the Hertfordshire Natural History Society in 1966. Gregory gave the Royal Society's Leeuwenhoek Lecture in 1970 and the British Mycological Society's inaugural Benefactors' Lecture in 1984. He died in 1986; he was married and had a son, a daughter, and three grandchildren.

Selected publications

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Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Philip Herries Gregory

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Philip Herries Gregory claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Philip Herries Gregory before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Philip Herries Gregory ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Philip Herries Gregory

In research: Philip Herries Gregory appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Philip Herries Gregory in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Philip Herries Gregory is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1907 births, 1986 deaths, 20th-century British agronomists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Philip Herries Gregory outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Philip Herries Gregory in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Philip Herries Gregory means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
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Frequently asked questions

What is Philip Herries Gregory in simple terms?

Why does Philip Herries Gregory matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Philip Herries Gregory?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Philip Herries Gregory.