Lionel Penrose | |
|---|---|
 Penrose, c. 1971 | |
| Born | Lionel Sharples Penrose (1898-06-11)11 June 1898[1] |
| Died | 12 May 1972(1972-05-12) (aged 73) London, UK |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Oliver Penrose Roger Penrose Jonathan Penrose Shirley Hodgson |
| Father | James Penrose |
| Scientific career | |
| Education | St John's College, Cambridge University of Vienna King's College London |
| Known for | Penrose triangle Penrose method Penrose stairs[4] Penrose's Law[5][6] Penrose square root law Penrose–Banzhaf index |
| Awards | Lasker Award[3] James Spence Medal 1964. |
| Fields | Paediatrics,Psychiatry,Genetics |
| Institutions | University of Cambridge University College London Western University |
Lionel Sharples PenroseFRS (11 June 1898 – 12 May 1972) was an Englishpsychiatrist, medicalgeneticist,paediatrician, mathematician andchess theorist, who carried out pioneering work on thegenetics ofintellectual disability.[6][7] Penrose was initially the Galton professor ofeugenics (1945–1963) atUniversity College London, before having his title changed to professor of human genetics (1963–1965) at his request. He was later emeritus professor.[8]
Penrose was educated at the Downs School,Colwall and theQuakerLeighton Park School,Reading.[8] On leaving school in 1916, he served, as aconscientious objector, with theFriends' Ambulance Unit/British Red Cross in France until the end of theFirst World War. He went on to study atSt John's College, Cambridge, where he was aCambridge Apostle.[8] At Cambridge, he gained a first class degree in moral sciences before leaving for Vienna for a year, to study at the psychological department at theUniversity of Vienna.[8] In 1928, he qualified with theconjoint in 1928 atSt Thomas' Hospital before qualifying for aDoctor of Medicine in 1930.[9]
Penrose undertook research intoschizophrenia, designing tests of intelligence that were non-verbal in nature that are still in use. He was one of the earliest investigators ofphenylketonuria in the 1930s.[8]
Penrose's "Colchester Survey", produced as the report in 1938, in collaboration with theMRC called theMRC special report: No.229, Clinical and genetic study of 1,280 cases of mental defect,[8] was the earliest serious attempt to study the genetics of intellectual disability. He found that the relatives of patients with severeintellectual disability were usually unaffected but some of them were affected with similar severity to the original patient, whereas the relatives of patients withmild intellectual disability tended mostly to have mild or borderline disability. Penrose went on to identify and study many of the genetic andchromosomal causes of intellectual disability (then calledmental deficiency). This body of work culminated in the book,The Biology of Mental Defect (Sidgwick and Jackson, Ltd., London, UK, 1949).
From 1939 to 1945 he was director of psychiatric research at the Ontario Hospital, lecturer in psychiatry atWestern University, and medical statistician to the province.[10] Penrose was a central figure in British medical genetics followingWorld War II. From 1945 to 1965, he worked as Galton Professor at theGalton Laboratory atUniversity College London. The first title of his chair was "Professor of Eugenics" (1945–1963), then he had it changed to "Professor of Human Genetics" (1963–1965). According to his successor, ProfessorHarry Harris, Penrose "never liked the name 'eugenics', because it seemed to him to be too much associated with uninformed and dangerous policies of racial purification." Harris also reported the "long delay" in changing this name was due to "legal problems" associated with the original donation fromFrancis Galton and described how Penrose simply ignored the "eugenics" element of his job title.[9]
Penrose's Law[5][6] states that the population size of prisons andpsychiatric hospitals are inversely related, although this is generally viewed as something of an oversimplification.[11]
Penrose, a member of theSociety of Friends (Quakers), was a lead figure in the Medical Association for the Prevention of War in the 1950s.
Penrose developed thePenrose method, a method for apportioning seats in a global assembly based on thesquare root of each nation's population. Such a voting system is based on the voting power of any voter (measured by thePenrose–Banzhaf index) decreasing with the size of the voting body as one over its square root. See alsoPenrose square root law.
Penrose was particularly interested in different facets of biology, for examplefingerprints,demography, andcytogenetics, which were a result of his research into theetiology of intellectual disability, especiallyDown syndrome. He did intensive research on the latter, communicating the results of his investigations in 1963 and winning theJoseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation Award for his contributions to the understanding of the causes of intellectual disability.[8]
Penrose received a number of awards and honours including the 1960 AlbertLasker Award for Basic Medical Research.[3] The Lasker citation read:
"Professor Penrose and his associates have been responsible over the years for studies which touch all aspects of human genetics, include genetic analyses of most of the knownhereditary diseases, contributions to mathematical genetics, biochemical genetics, the study of gene linkage in man, and theoretical work on the mutagenic effect of ionizing radiations. Most recently their attention has been turned to abnormalities of human chromosomes associated with congenital defects, particularly mongolism [Down syndrome]."[3]
Penrose was awarded theJames Spence Gold Medal of theRoyal College of Paediatrics and Child Health in 1964 for major contributions in human genetics and extensive research intoDown syndrome andIntellectual disability."[12]
Lionel Penrose's father wasJames Doyle Penrose. His mother, Elisabeth Josephine, was daughter ofAlexander Peckover, 1st Baron Peckover; his brother was SirRoland Penrose, both British artists.[13][14] He married Margaret Leathes in 1928 and they had four children:
After Penrose's death, Margaret married the mathematicianMax Newman (1897–1984). She died in 1989.
Careful examination ... reveals that such a state of affairs is not as clear cut as Penrose and other later writers have suggested.
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