1891-1941

Canadian Physician and Physiologist

Frederick Banting, along with Charles H. Best (1899-1978), discovered insulin, a hormone secreted by the pancreas that regulates sugar in the blood. This discovery led to the treatment of diabetes, a fatal disease. For the discovery of insulin, Banting won the 1923 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine, the first to be awarded to a Canadian.

Born November 14, 1891, near Alliston, Ontario, Canada, Banting was the youngest of five children of William Thompson Banting, a farmer whose parents were Irish immigrants. Banting attended the University of Ontario with the goal of becoming a Methodist minister, but changed to medicine and completed his degree in 1916.

After graduation, he was immediately drafted into the Canadian Medical Corps as a lieutenant during World War I. In 1918, while on the battlefield in France, his right arm was severely wounded by shrapnel, but he...