A medical research question
Banting trained in medicine at Toronto and served as a military physician during the First World War. Afterward he investigated the relationship between pancreas and diabetes, proposing an experimental approach to obtaining an active internal secretion. Toronto physiologist Macleod provided support for the work.
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The Toronto collaboration
Banting and Best studied pancreatic extracts in animals in 1921. Collip joined late that year and improved purification before clinical progress in 1922. Animal experiments, preparation of extracts, observation of patients and expansion of production involved distinct contributions from several researchers and institutions.
Recognition and later research
Banting and Macleod received the 1923 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine; Banting shared part of his prize money with Best. He continued medical research, including aviation physiology, and died in an aircraft accident in Newfoundland in 1941 while travelling toward Britain.