Adrian Stokes

Life & Legacy

Captain Adrian Stokes, (9 February 1887 – 19 September 1927) was an Irish physician and microbiologist and British Army soldier who worked as professor of bacteriology at Trinity College Dublin, and later as Sir Willian Dunn Professor of Pathology in the University of London at Guy's Hospital. He served in the Royal Army Medical Corps during World War I and was member of the Yellow Fever Commission in West Africa.
Stokes is most well known for his discovery of the virus (now named Orthoflavivirus flava) that caused yellow fever, the disease with which he died. He also discovered a bacterium Spirochaeta icterohaemorrhagiae (now called Leptospira interrogans), which causes epidemic jaundice (and other symptoms now collectively called leptospirosis), in rats which directly implied rodent control as the most important preventive measure. He developed nasal cannula used for giving oxygen through the nose.