by Hannah Bauman
HerbalGram. 2016; American Botanical Council
Friends, colleagues, and family
mourn the passing of Thomas J. Mabry, PhD, a natural products chemist and
biologist. He was 83 years old. Mabry spent his career in the department of
botany at the University of Texas – Austin (UT), working from 1962 until his
retirement as professor emeritus in 2006. During his tenure, Mabry mentored
over 70 graduate students for both master’s and doctoral degrees.
“Tom will always be remembered by the
scientific community for his cutting-edge contributions to chemotaxonomy,
structural elucidation of important medicinal and poisonous plant natural
products, and insights into the biochemistry and evolution of the very unique
pigments known as the betalains,” wrote Eloy Rodriguez, PhD, who earned his
doctorate under Mabry’s supervision (email to M. Blumenthal, December 21,
2015). Mabry’s research group was the first to identify the structures of
various natural compounds known as betalains. These plant pigments are present
in beets (Beta vulgaris, Chenopodiaceae), cacti (Opuntia
spp., Cactaceae),
and bougainvillea (Bougainvillea spp., Nyctaginaceae), but they are
wholly separate from red-purple-blue anthocyanins.
Mabry was born in Commerce, Texas,
and grew up on a farm. After graduating as his high school’s valedictorian, he
attended East Texas State College (now a part of the Texas A&M University
system) and earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemistry. In
between earning his master’s and his doctorate, he served two years in the Air
Force as a commissioned research chemist. In 1956, he earned his doctorate in
organic chemistry from Rice University in Houston. Among his numerous
professional and organizational affiliations, Mabry served on the Advisory
Board of the American Botanical Council (ABC).
During Mabry’s postdoctoral
fellowship at the University of Zurich’s Organic Chemistry Institute, he worked
under the supervision of Professor Andre Dreiding to determine the structure of
betanin, which at the time was thought to be an anthocyanin pigment in red
beets. Dreiding’s group proved otherwise, recognizing a completely new class of
pigments: the betalains.1
After Mabry joined the faculty at
UT, he dedicated himself to both his students and his research. Shortly after,
in 1966, he organized the Phytochemical Society of North America and served as
its first president. Maureen Bonness, PhD, another doctoral student of Mabry’s,
recalled that he was awarded numerous grants and always made sure that his
students had the funds they required (email to M. Blumenthal, January 2, 2016).
“Tom sincerely
cared about everyone in his group,” she wrote. “We were the lucky ones, to be in the
Tom Mabry group.”
“I will always remember Tom for his
grand generosity, his outstanding mentorship, and his willingness to find ways
to support the large number of graduate students in his laboratory,” wrote
Rodriguez. “Many
of the former students were, and are still, outstanding scientists in their
respective fields.”
“I am very fortunate and grateful for
having crossed paths with Tom early in my life,” wrote Barbara Timmermann, PhD,
ABC Advisory Board member and Distinguished Professor at the University of
Kansas (email to M. Blumenthal, January 21, 2016). “I learned a great deal from his
teachings, perennial enthusiasm, and willingness to chart new territories in
the interface of chemistry and botany…. Always generous with his time and
ideas, he led by example and I’m glad I listened to him. When I thanked Tom on
graduation day for giving me wings and teaching me how to fly, he replied
simply, ‘Pass it on,’ and this I keep trying.”
Mabry served as the chair of the
botany department at UT from 1980-1986, and under his leadership, it gained
national recognition and acclaim. “Tom was a major force in the botany department at UT and,
with an array of gifted colleagues, ensured the department’s status as the best
botany department in the country until it was reorganized out of existence,” wrote
Beryl Simpson, PhD, C.L. Lundell Professor of Systematic Botany at UT, and
author of a leading textbook, Economic Botany: Plants in Our World
(email to M. Blumenthal, December 22, 2015). “He was a major factor in my deciding
to join the faculty.”
The University of Texas honored
Mabry’s achievements and leadership by appointing him as a Jack C. Wrather
Centennial Endowed Fellow at the university’s IC2 Institute in 1986,
by bestowing upon him the UT-Austin Graduate School’s Outstanding Doctoral
Teaching Award in 1991, and, upon his retirement, by creating the Professor Tom
J. Mabry Endowed Excellence Fund in Phytochemistry and Plant Biology. Ten years
later, in 2001, Mabry received the Norman R. Farnsworth Research Achievement
Award from the American Society of Pharmacognosy. During his acceptance speech,
Mabry said:
I proudly report that my role in
complex biological chemistry investigations, and my stimulating interactions
with a large number of fascinating colleagues and special friends continue
still today to be a great, exhilarating, 40-year ride! It is written that a man
is not old until regrets take the place of dreams. Well, I’m pleased to start
each sunrise with dreams filled with love and hope; happily, a few of the
dreams are even realistic. Just as in my weekly card game with seven good
friends, I urge each new day to cut the cards, deal me a hand, and let us play!
In addition to these honors, Mabry
received numerous accolades, awards, and grants over his lengthy career: a
Guggenheim Fellowship at the University of Freiburg, Germany; the Alexander von
Humboldt Senior Scientist Award for research with Professor Dietmar Behnke at
the University of Heidelberg, Germany; the American Chemical Society Award for
the Application of Chemistry to Food and Agriculture; and the Pergamon Prize
from the journal Phytochemistry.
“Tom figured out how to make things
happen: how to be successful within phytochemical research, within scientific
publishing, within academia, within the vagaries of funding, and across
continents,” wrote Bonness. “The nexus was his cultivation of a prodigious network of
people who were not only collaborators, but also friends. All this was done
with a certain gusto, calculated, yet willing to take risks, and a hint of
mischievousness.”
Memorial services for Mabry were
held in Austin on December 29, 2015. He is survived by his wife, Helga Johanna
Humm Mabry; daughter, Michele Mabry Cooley; son, Patrick Thomas Mabry; three
grandchildren; and hundreds of deeply grateful mentees, both official and
otherwise.
“The legacy of Tom Mabry will live on
forever in his many books, publications, assays, and his students,” Rodriguez
concluded. “I
can truly say that Tom will be greatly missed by family and the world
community, and most especially by a former young undergraduate.”
—Hannah Bauman
Reference
1. Mabry JT. Selected topics from forty
years of natural products research: betalains to flavonoids, antiviral proteins, and neurotoxic
nonprotein amino acids. J Nat Prod. 2001;64(12):1596-1604.
