Some Remembrances of D. J. Brown by a Colleague

Gordon B. Barlin (Ph.D. (ANU); D.Sc. (Sydney)) worked for approximately 40 years in the John Curtin School of Medical Research, ANU, on the syntheses of nitrogen heterocyclic compounds and the examination of their physico-chemical and biological properties, including tautomerism, kinetics of nucleophilic substitution, enhancement of anticancer activity by phleomycin, new potential antimalarials, and an extensive study of substituted imidazo[1,2-b]pyridazines for interaction with central and peripheral nervous system receptors. Desmond (Des) J. Brown was a world-renowned heterocyclic chemist whose research focussed on pyrimidines and nitrogen heterocycles generally. This included an extensive study of the Dimroth Rearrangement (Scheme 1) in the pyrimidines and related compounds.[1] He published,200 research papers and 12 volumes in the Wiley-Interscience series, The Chemistry of Heterocyclic Compounds. His last one was published in 2008, as mentioned in his obituary.[2] He was very knowledgeable in chemical nomenclature and was frequently consulted on the matter. This issue of the Australian Journal of Chemistry, edited by Wilfred Armarego, and containing papers by former colleagues, collaborators, staff, and students of Des Brown, is a measure of the esteem held by those who knew and worked with him (Fig. 1). I first met Des at the end of 1956 when the Department of Medical Chemistry had moved from temporary laboratories in London (at the Wellcome Research Institution