͵͵

In Memoriam

In memoriam: John W. Brown

ASBMB Today Staff
Oct. 24, 2022

John Wesley Brown, a chemistry professor who studied links between diet and mental illness, and a 60-year member of the ͵͵ and ͵͵ Biology, died March 21, in Louisville, Kentucky. He was 96.

John Brown

Brown was born in Chicago on Dec. 2, 1925, the only child of Earl Jackson and Myrtle Brown. He enlisted in the Army and volunteered for combat at age 18. He served on front lines in the Battle of the Bulge during World War II and suffered such severe frostbite and trenchfoot that he was taken out of service on Christmas Day, 1944, and hospitalized for 10 weeks. Doctors were able to save his feet, and he was awarded a Purple Heart. After his service, Brown attended Elmhurst College on the GI Bill for a bachelor’s degree in chemistry. He then earned a master's degree and a Ph.D. in biochemistry at the University of Illinois Medical Center.

Brown joined the University of Louisville Medical School faculty in 1957. His long career at the U of L included teaching, developing new courses, doing research, and serving in administrative positions. In 1964, he received the Kentucky State Medical Association Faculty Scientific Achievement Award. He taught various chemistry courses until he was 78.

Newspaper photo (1978) of John Brown and John Thurmond looking at papers.
Courtesy of Suzanne Shepherd
An article in a 1978 issue of the University of Louisville Potential focused on the research John Brown (left) and John Thurmond did on links between diet and mental illness.

In one of Brown’s last major research projects, he studied the effect of diet on behavior, teaming up with faculty from the pharmacology, physiology, and psychiatry departments of the university’s medical school and the psychology department in the college of arts and sciences. Six of his 26 scientific publications related to this research, which focused on how certain amino acids commonly found in food affect the brain when they react with enzymes to produce neurotransmitters. Brown and a psychology professor, John Thurmond, hypothesized that feeding patients high concentrations of the amino acids that help produce serotonin and other neurotransmitters might reduce some symptoms of mental illness.

The only subject Brown taught longer than chemistry was the Bible, according to his obituary; he was a student of Biblical archeology, ancient Jewish history and the teachings of Jesus. He and his wife, Lois, were active members of a Great Books Club for more than 40 years.

In retirement, Brown travelled and continued his life-long hobbies of carpentry and watercolor painting. For years, he designed and built toys for the Salvation Army to distribute at Christmas.

Lois Brown died in 2003. John Brown is survived by his children, Suzanne Shepherd and husband Don, Janice Brown, and Paul Brown and wife Debbie; three grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

Enjoy reading ASBMB Today?

Become a member to receive the print edition four times a year and the digital edition weekly.

Learn more
ASBMB Today Staff

This article was written by a member or members of the ASBMB Today staff.

Related articles

In memoriam: Bernard Agranoff
Christopher Radka
In memoriam: John Edmond
Laurel Oldach
In memoriam: Horst Schulz
Manfred Philipp
In memoriam: Bengt Samuelsson
Christopher Radka

Get the latest from ASBMB Today

Enter your email address, and we’ll send you a weekly email with recent articles, interviews and more.

Latest in People

People highlights or most popular articles

Guiding grocery carts to shape healthy habits
Award

Guiding grocery carts to shape healthy habits

Nov. 21, 2024

Robert “Nate” Helsley will receive the Walter A. Shaw Young Investigator in Lipid Research Award at the 2025 ASBMB Annual Meeting, April 12–15 in Chicago.

Leading the charge for gender equity
Award

Leading the charge for gender equity

Nov. 19, 2024

Nicole Woitowich will receive the ASBMB Emerging Leadership Award at the 2025 ASBMB Annual meeting, April 12–15 in Chicago.

Honors for de la Fuente, Mittag and De La Cruz
Member News

Honors for de la Fuente, Mittag and De La Cruz

Nov. 18, 2024

César de la Fuente receives the American Society of Microbiology’s Award for Early Career Basic Research. Tanja Mittag and Enrique M. De La Cruz are named fellows by the Biophysical Society.

In memoriam: Horst Schulz
In Memoriam

In memoriam: Horst Schulz

Nov. 18, 2024

He was a professor emeritus at City College of New York and at the CUNY Graduate Center in Manhattan whose work concentrated on increasing our understanding of mitochondrial fatty acid metabolism and an ASBMB member since 1971.

Computational and biophysical approaches to disordered proteins
Award

Computational and biophysical approaches to disordered proteins

Nov. 14, 2024

Rohit Pappu will receive the 2025 DeLano Award for Computational Biosciences at the ASBMB Annual Meeting, April 12-15 in Chicago.

Join the pioneers of ferroptosis at cell death conference
In-person Conference

Join the pioneers of ferroptosis at cell death conference

Nov. 13, 2024

Meet Brent Stockwell, Xuejun Jiang and Jin Ye — the co-chairs of the ASBMB’s 2025 meeting on metabolic cross talk and biochemical homeostasis research.