1950s – Tropical diseases studied
- From 1951 to 1965 in a QIMR field station at the Innisfail Hospital in north Queensland, researchers investigated leptospirosis, scrub typhus, dengue and other tropical fevers.
- In 1954, an outbreak of dengue fever in north Queensland heightened the need for research into arboviral diseases.
- Researchers searched extensively among native animals for rickettsia and other viruses, finding Toxoplasma gondii and strains of brucellosis in Queensland rodents.
- Dr John Pope discovered the murine leukaemia virus, found in a common house mouse for which he was rewarded with a Rockefeller Fellowship to the United States.
