---
node: au_howard_florey
type: person
slug: howard_florey
title: "Howard Florey"
lead: "The Australian-born pathologist who developed penicillin into a practical drug and shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine."
published: 2026-07-15
updated: 2026-07-15
---

## Who they were

Born in Adelaide, South Australia, Florey led pathology at the University of Oxford, where he built a team to study penicillin.

## What they did

Penicillin had been discovered by Alexander Fleming; Florey, Ernst Chain, and others purified it and proved it could cure infections as a drug — saving many lives in the Second World War.

## Legacy

In 1945 he shared the Nobel Prize with Fleming and Chain. Florey is regarded as one of the most influential scientists Australia has produced.