Haynes, Duncan H(arold) 1945-

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HAYNES, Duncan H(arold) 1945-

(Dirk Wyle)

PERSONAL: Born June 27, 1945, in Owosso, MI; son of Alfred Cleveland (a journalist) and Mary Frances (a federal employee; maiden name, Macdonald) Haynes; married Celeste Ann Howard, October 10, 1965 (divorced, 1969); married Gisela Busche, June 28, 1974; children: (first marriage) Norman Douglas; (second marriage) Karl Harold, Ellen Ursula. Ethnicity: "White, Anglo-Saxon Protestant." Education: Butler University, B.S., 1966; University of Pennsylvania, Ph.D., 1970; postdoctoral study at Max Planck Institut für Biophysikalische Chemie, 1970-73. Religion: Protestant. Hobbies and other interests: Music (saxophone and violin), sailing, snorkeling.

ADDRESSES: Home and office—4051 Barbarossa Ave., Miami, FL 33133-6628. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, assistant professor, 1973-77, associate professor, 1977-82, professor of pharmacology, 1982-2001; retired, 2001. Pharma-Logic, Inc. (inventors and developers of medical technology), founder and principal, 1983—. Inventor of phospholipid-coated micro-droplets and micro-crystals as an injectable delivery system for water-insoluble drugs; holder of several patents. Military service: U.S. Naval Reserve, 1979-89; became lieutenant commander.

MEMBER: Mystery Writers of America (member of board of directors, Florida chapter), Biophysical Society, American Society for Clinical Pharmacology (fellow), American Society of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Society for Clinical Investigation, American Physiological Society, Society of General Physiologists, Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, Society of Armed Forces Medical Scientists, Controlled Release Society, Center for Health Technology.

AWARDS, HONORS: Research grants from U.S. Public Health Service, beginning 1973, and Florida affiliate of American Heart Association, 1974, 1978, 1988; Governor's Award for Outstanding Contribution to Science and Technology, governor of Florida, 1989; Icon Award, South Florida chapter, NH Writers Association.

WRITINGS:

MYSTERY NOVELS; UNDER PSEUDONYM DIRK WYLE

Pharmacology Is Murder, Rainbow Books (Highland City, FL), 1998.

Biotechnology Is Murder, Rainbow Books (Highland City, FL), 2000.

Medical School Is Murder, Rainbow Books (Highland City, FL), 2001.

Amazon Gold, Rainbow Books (Highland City, FL), 2003.

OTHER

Contributor of more than eighty articles to scientific journals.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Additional mystery novels featuring Ben Candidi, under pseudonym Dirk Wyle.

SIDELIGHTS: Duncan H. Haynes told CA: "As the son of a newspaperman who was always looking for a story and of a mother who always read me a story at bedtime, one might wonder why it took me forty-seven years to do any serious writing. True, I served as the editor of Wednesday editions of the Shortridge High School's daily Echo and won some awards from an Indianapolis Quill & Scroll chapter. But Sinclair Lewis's Arrowsmith was also found in my father's bookshelves. Biomedical science became my first calling.

"My early research experience did in some ways match that of my fictional hero. I worked long hours in the laboratory to pry secrets from the cell. I worked under the guidance of two of the best minds in the world (professors Berton C. Pressman and Manfred Eigen). I studied how certain antibiotics transport ions across cell membranes. After three years of immersion in the science and culture of Germany, I accepted a position at the University of Miami, where I set up a research program on calcium transport in muscle. This research led me to the study of calcium handling in blood platelets and to collaborative studies with physicians, which improved our understanding of thrombosis.

"In 1982, at the age of thirty-seven, I realized that chemical compositions I had developed as 'model systems' to understand cell membrane structure could actually serve as injectable delivery systems for introducing hard-to-deliver drugs into the body. This led to a fifteen-year effort which resulted in a portfolio of patents covering the industrialized world, to the formation of three companies which are employing over sixty-five people, and to the commercialization of the technology. During these fifteen years of 'bootstrapping' my company and plowing back earnings into the technology, I found encouragement in the good example of Duncan Macdonald, my maternal grandfather, who mined gold in Alaska and who, like his wife, died prematurely as a victim of harsh environment.

"During my years of study and laboratory research, one thing was constant: a novel on the night stand and a reading light burning well past midnight. At the age of forty-seven I grew dissatisfied with reading other people's stories. I picked up my pen as Dirk Wyle and devoted five years of evenings and weekends to my first 'Ben Candidi' novel. Sustaining this effort was a passionate desire to achieve a realistic description of the human side of the scientific endeavor while telling a good story. Sale of the patents and technology delivered financial independence. In early 2001, at the age of fifty-five, I retired to devote myself to writing. I now write full-time, with the goal of adding eighteen more books to the 'Ben Candidi' series."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, April 15, 1998, Mary Frances Wilkens, review of Pharmacology Is Murder, p. 1395; August, 2003, Mary Frances Wilkens, review of Amazon Gold, p. 1962.

Library Journal, April 1, 2002, Rex E. Klett, review of Biotechnology Is Murder, p. 135.

Publishers Weekly, October 15, 2001, p. 50.