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BRITTON CHANCE |
Britton Chance; biophysicist was Olympic sailing champion
NEW YORK — Britton Chance, a biophysicist who did pioneering research on how living organisms produce and manage energy and helped develop diagnostic tools for cancer detection and other studies, died Nov. 16 in Philadelphia.
Dr. Chance, who was also a world-class yachtsman and won an Olympic gold medal in sailing in 1952, was 97.
Over a lifetime of research, Dr. Chance focused on the observation and measurement of chemical reactions within cells, tissue, and the body. But unlike most researchers, he also had expertise in mechanics, electronics, and optics, and a great facility in instrument building. His innovations helped transform theoretical science into biochemical and biophysical principles.
Early in his career he invented a tool, known as a stopped-flow apparatus, for measuring chemical reactions involving enzymes; it led to the establishment of a principle of enzyme kinetics known as the enzyme-substrate complex.
Dr. Chance demonstrated that when an enzyme acts upon another molecular agent known as a substrate, the first step in the process is the formation of an association between them called an enzyme-substrate complex. (Dr. Chance named his sailing yachts Complex I and Complex II.)
He won Olympic gold at Helsinki as skipper of a three-man crew in the 5.5-meter yacht class.
As a boy he had twin gifts for sailing and ingenious problem solving; he was a teen when he invented an auto-steering mechanism for ships that detected when they veered off course.
During World War II, Dr. Chance worked at the radiation laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a government-financed military research program commonly known as Rad Lab, on a team that focused on the development and enhancement of radar.
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