Producing molecular therapeutics from human blood: Edwin cohn’s wartime enterprise

One of the most celebrated advances in military medicine during World War II was the development of blood plasma fractions as therapeutic agents, largely through the leadership of Edwin Conn, head of the Department of Physical Chemistry at Harvard Medical School. As the United States began mobilizing for war, Cohn embarked on a project to identify components of blood which could be used to deter shock in combat victims. The rapid success of his laboratory in devising a blood-derived transfusion material created a leadership opportunity for Cohn in the subsequent collaboration with the military and industry to mass-produce serum albumin from blood donated through the American Red Cross. Other plasma fractions of therapeutic value were also isolated by Cohn’s research team during the war and manufactured as medical commodities. Cohn continued to work with pharmaceutical producers and clinicians after the military sponsorship ceased by exercising patents on his methods and supervising the establishment of quality control standards for industrial production.