 Nobel Prize-winning pharmacologist James Black, whose breakthrough beta-blocker drugs help treat millions of heart patients and save thousands of lives, has died at age 85, his former university said Monday. Awarded a scholarship to study at Scotland's St. Andrews University when he was only 15, Black applied himself to the study of medicine, meeting his future wife Hilary Vaughan at an undergraduate ball in 1944. During a career which spanned industry and the academic world, he established the physiology department at University of Glasgow and lectured at both University College and King's College in London. Although it's his work in the field of heart treatments for which he is best known, Black also made significant discoveries in the development of drugs to treat heartburn and ulcers. He won the Nobel Prize for Medicine for his achievements in 1988 and was awarded Britain's Order of Merit _ a rare honor bestowed by the queen _ in 2000. The University of Dundee in Scotland, which Black served as chancellor from 1992 to 2006, said the scientist died Sunday but gave few further details. A university spokesman said Sir James's funeral would be held on Monday at St Columba's Church in London.
– James Black, the Nobel prize-winning scientist whose invention of beta-blocker drugs is credited with saving hundreds of thousands of lives, has died after a long illness. The Scotsman's discovery of propranolol and pronethalol revolutionized the treatment of heart patients and was "one of the few things that really deserves the moniker 'landmark,'" the chief of the American Heart Association tells AP. Black, who also pioneered treatments for heartburn and ulcers, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Medicine in 1988 and was Chancellor of the University of Dundee from 1992 to 2006. "He was a great scientist who took a keen interest in the development of our research here at Dundee, but he was also a great man to know," the university's vice-chancellor told the Scotsman. "He inspired so many people, from students to senior academics and industrialists, right up until the last few months of his life."