Sir John Maddox, Former Editor of Nature, Dead at 83. (April 16, 2009)

Following is the announcement of the death of one of the world's most influential science journalist/editors.

Philip Campbell Nature's current editor-in-chief writes in part in this week's lead editorial: "It was during his first stint [1966-73] that he laid the foundations for Nature as it is today. Importantly (JM liked to start sentences with adverbs), he threw aside the highly informal and somewhat crony-based system for selecting papers and established a system of peer review... This move was not without his own reservations — he liked to say that the 1953 paper on the structure of DNA would never have passed peer review. He never lost his distrust of such refereeing as an obstacle to the truly original, and occasionally dispensed with it altogether during his first stint as editor.

    "JM was unique, and those of us who knew him and learned from him will feel the world to be a smaller place in his absence. But his was a powerful spirit, and we continue to thrive on it."