Leonard T. Skeggs Jr., professor emeritus of biochemistry, died December 4.

Skeggs earned his master's degree in 1941 and doctorate in 1948 in biochemistry at what is now CWRU. He joined its faculty in 1950, was promoted to full professor in 1969 and became emeritus professor in 1988. He also directed the hypertension research laboratory at the Cleveland Veterans Affairs Hospital.

In 1992, he and he wife, Jean, a 1979 graduate of Western Reserve College, endowed the Leonard and Jean Skeggs Professorship in Biochemistry, a chair held since its inception by Richard W. Hanson, former chairman of the biochemistry department.

Hanson described Skeggs as a very imaginative and resourceful person.

"I've never met anyone as resourceful as Leonard Skeggs; he could build anything. If I were lost in the woods, I'd want to be with him. Leonard could take a piece of string, some pieces of wood and a rubber band and make an airplane," said Hanson.

He was hardly exaggerating, since Skeggs finished a magnificent 30-foot power boat only a few months before his death.

And resourceful he was. Skeggs is best known for inventing the Autoanalyzer, a machine to analyze components in a continuous flow of blood, to get rid of what he called the "train of test tubes" required for such work.

He set up a workshop in the basement of his home and worked on the Autoanalyzer during his spare time. Initially, he found no interest from manufacturers, but Technicon Corp., purchased the design in 1954. The machine offered hospitals and labs a low-cost, very accessible method of doing routine blood screenings. The descendants of his instrument today form the basis of automated clinical chemistry.

Skeggs also worked on one of the first artificial kidneys, collaborating with Jack Leonards of CWRU's department of clinical biochemistry. The new artificial kidney was a considerable improvement over previous prototypes and was widely used throughout the United States. Later, a Seattle physician devised a method that used a permanent shunt and Teflon tubing to allow patients to receive dialysis up to three times weekly.

Paul Berg, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1980 for his work on the development of recombinant DNA technology, worked with Skeggs on the artificial kidney while a young graduate student in the department of biochemistry.

Skeggs' area of research was the chemistry of the renin-angiotensin system. In 1968, he won the Vernon Stouffer award for contributions to this area. The award lauded Skeggs for "identifying the structure of angiotensin, for the discovery of angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) and for the synthesis of renin substrate." These achievements have contributed broadly to the understanding of the physiology and biochemistry of hypertension. He was inducted into the Cleveland Medical Hall of Fame in 1997.

He was born Aug. 2, 1918. He did his undergraduate work at the Youngstown State University, which years later awarded him an honorary degree. He also received an honorary degree from Baldwin-Wallace College.

He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and was awarded several medals, including the Purple Heart.

He and his wife were married in 1941 and had three children: Laura Jean Tradowsky, Josephine Dick and David C. Skeggs Most recently, they made their home in Kirtland.