William Trager

William Trager (20 March 1910 – 22 January 2005) was an American parasitologist, professor at Rockefeller University, and member of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States.

[2] This work formed his PhD thesis, titled "The cultivation of some intestinal flagellates of termites and the nature of the symbiosis between these protozoa and their insect host" which he was granted in 1933.

[3] Following his Ph.D., Trager joined the lab of Rudolf Glaser in the Department of Animal and Plant Pathology in the Princeton, New Jersey division of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research as a postdoctoral fellow.

[1] During World War II, Trager served as a captain in the US Army Sanitary Corps supervising clinical trials with the antimalarial atabrine.

[2] After the war, Trager turned his research focus to malaria, investigating the conditions required to grow Plasmodium parasites in culture.

[2] In 1950, Trager moved along with the rest of the Department of Animal and Plant Pathology to the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research campus in New York City, where he would work until his retirement.

[2] Jensen greatly improved the culture method by introducing a carbon-dioxide rich environment through the use of a simple air-tight candle jar, where a flame is lit and allowed to burn out.