Research physician Harvey Alter dedicated his career to studies intended to ensure the safety of blood transfusions. In his research on viral hepatitis he co-discovered the so-called Australia antigen which proved to be the key to detecting the hepatitis B virus. He was the key scientist on the research that led to the discovery of hepatitis C in 1969. These findings provided to be means to reducing the incidence of blood transfusion caused hepatitis to near zero. More recently he was working on a DNA approach to vaccines. Alter came to the NIH in 1961 as a clinical associate. He then spent three years with the Georgetown University Hospital. In 1969 he came back to NIH as a Senior Investigator in the clinical Center’s Department of Transfusion Medicine. He then became Chief of the Clinical Studies and in 1987, Associate Director of Research in the Department of Transfusion Medicine at the NIH Clinical Center. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the Nobel Prize (2020).
