Darwin J. Prockop, pioneering molecular biologist, professor emeritus, research director, and mentor, has died at 94
He was an expert in stem cells and gene therapy, and worked at Penn, Jefferson, Hahnemann, and Allegheny Universities. Scientists, he said, “live on challenge and excitement and tough problems.”
Darwin J. Prockop, 94, of Philadelphia, pioneering molecular biologist, retired professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Thomas Jefferson and Hahnemann Universities, research director, and mentor, died Monday, Jan. 22, of neuromuscular disease at his home in Society Hill.
Renowned for his groundbreaking investigation and important discoveries in biochemistry and cell biology, Dr. Prockop focused much of his 58-year career on collagen, the genetics of collagen disorders, and the therapeutic potential of adult stem cells. He announced the discovery of genetic mutations that cause osteoarthritis and aortic aneurysms in 1990, and organized the first scientific meeting focused on multipotent stem cells in 2001.
In 1991, he led a team at Jefferson that was tasked with determining whether Abraham Lincoln’s tall, gaunt frame and sunken eyes were likely symptoms of Marfan syndrome. The answer was yes.
“There may be other fields as exciting and rewarding to work in, but I have trouble thinking of them,” Dr. Prockop said in an online interviewwith the International Society for Cell & Gene Therapy. “We are learning the secrets of biology and of life itself.”
Dr. Prockop was revered as a mentor as well as a scientist, and he embraced collaboration and collegiality wherever he worked. He was professor of medicine at Penn from 1961 to 1972 and left to serve as professor and chair of the biochemistry department at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Piscataway.
He returned to Philadelphia in 1986 as professor and chair of the biochemistry and molecular biology department at Jefferson, and was professor and director of the Center for Gene Therapy at Hahnemann and Allegheny Universities from 1996 to 2000. He went on to spend eight years as director of the Center for Gene Therapy at Tulane University in New Orleans and 11 years as director of the Center for Regenerative Medicine at Texas A&M University. He retired in 2019.
Dr. Prockop published nearly 600 scholarly articles and was quoted often in The Inquirer and other publications. A former colleague called him a “remarkable scientist, eminent scholar, and a kindhearted and fair-minded person who treated everyone with respect.” Another said: “His drive for science and discovery was unparalleled.”
He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, and National Academy of Inventors, and he won the inaugural Career Achievement Award from the International Society for Cell & Gene Therapy in 2016. In 2020, the society created the Darwin J. Prockop Mentoring Award.
Finding answers to big questions was his thing. “We’ve got to do things that are high-risk,” he told The Inquirer in 1990. “We live on challenge and excitement and tough problems.”
Darwin Johnson Prockop was born Aug. 31, 1929. He grew up in Palmerton, Pa., about 15 miles northwest of Allentown, and was an exceptional student in high school.
A natural problem solver with an aptitude for science, he earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy at Haverford College in 1951 and a master’s degree in animal physiology as a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Oxford in England in 1953. He earned his medical degree from Penn in 1956 and doctorate in biochemistry in 1961 from George Washington University.
He interned briefly as a medical practitioner but realized he was better at the science part of it. “What I knew was that I liked to deal with problems,” he told The Inquirer. “You start out with something where you don’t know what’s going on. …I love to sit and struggle and try to figure out what’s the key.”
He met Elinor Sacks at a party when they both worked at the National Institutes of Health, and they married in 1962, and had daughter Susan and son David. They lived in West Philadelphia when he was at Penn and later in Society Hill. His wife died earlier.
Dr. Prockop walked to work when he was at Jefferson and flew weekly to New Orleans when he worked at Tulane and to College Station when he was at Texas A&M. He was good at design and staged the interiors of his lab and the family’s second home on Long Beach Island.
He especially liked to engage with his children and their friends about their schoolwork, social lives, and other parts of their young lives. “He was thoughtful and kind,” his daughter said. “He was generous with his time and energy.”
A former student said in a tribute: “He has left an outsized scientific legacy that will be with us for a long time.” A former colleague said: “He is far and away one of the most brilliant and generous people I have ever met.”
In addition to his children, Dr. Prockop is survived by two grandchildren and other relatives. A brother died earlier.
Private services are to be held later.
Donations in his name may be made to the Darwin J. Prockop Early Stage Professional Scholarship Fund, International Society for Cell & Gene Therapy, Suite 325, 744 West Hastings St., Vancouver, B.C., Canada, V6C 1A5.