Donald Devereux Woods (16 February 1912 - 6 November 1964) was a British microbiologist.
[1] In 1939 he joined the Medical Research Council Unit for Bacterial Chemistry, working at the Middlesex Hospital, London.
[1] Distinguished for work in Bacterial biochemistry; his demonstration (1940) of the antagonistic action of p-aminobenzoic acid against the antibacterial action of sulphonamides allowed him to propose the theory of competitive inhibition of essential metabolites by substances of similar constitution which has received world wide acceptance and has led to important advances in nutrition (folic acid) and design of inhibitory substances.
Woods himself in 1940 undertook secret work which deprived him then of the power to follow up his discovery.
Since the war however he has developed a school of microbiology in Oxford, actively engaged in folic acid and related studies.