Thomas Edward Lowe was born in Melbourne on 24 October 1908 and died on 12 June 1990. He was the son of the Honorable Sir Charles Lowe, sometime Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria and chancellor of the University of Melbourne, whose family arrived in Australia from New Zealand in 1865. Tom Lowe's mother was Clara Rhode Lowe (née Dickson) whose family came here in 1842. Tom Lowe was educated at Scotch College, Melbourne intending to become an engineer - foreshadowing one of his particular interests in biophysics - but deciding on medicine. He enrolled at the University of Melbourne and graduated MB BS in 1932 with high honours in each year proceeding MD in 1934. The DSc was conferred in 1945. It is of interest that after the war he enrolled for the Diploma of Commerce, passing accountancy with honours.

Having been and RMO at the Royal Melbourne Hospital from 1933 to 1934 he left for London and postgraduate training at The London Hospital. His acquaintance there with Sir john Parkinson was a determinant for his future as a cardiologist. Having passed the MRCP London examination (FRCP 1952) he was appointed a registrar at St Mary's Hospital. An extended visit to the USA in 1936 led to continuing contacts with Dr Paul D White, returning to Melbourne that year to be appointed to St Vincent's Hospital, first as honorary assistant (diabetic clinic) and by 1934 honorary physician to outpatients. When World War II broke out Lowe was a temporary captain in the AAMC but was retained for part-time military duty together with his other appointment as a tutor, with research facilities, in Professor Sir Peter MacCallum's department of pathology at the University of Melbourne. Promoted to a senior lectureship, he did extensive research in the structure and function of cardiac muscle. He was given leave of absence in 1943 to become a full-time specialist physician-major in the AIF and was posted to Queensland. Discharge from the AIF was delayed by a serious renal illness, fortunately without sequelae, and in 1946 he rejoined the pathology department resuming his outpatient appointment at St Vincent's Hospital.

In 1948 he spent a year overseas as a Rockefeller Foundation Fellow where he became intimately involved in the remarkable advances in cardiology, including the exciting developments in cardiac surgery, at the Western Reserve University, Cleveland. There he renewed contacts with colleagues from US Fourth General Hospital who had worked in Melbourne from 1943 to 1945. A chance meeting at Western Reserve with Sir John McMichael led to Lowe's short visit to London on his way home. There he helped McMichael, newly appointed to the chair of medicine at Hammersmith Hospital, to set up laboratories incorporating his American experience in research. A life-long friendship resulted. While still overseas Lowe was appointed foundation director of the newly established clinical research unit of Alfred Hospital taking up his post in 1949 to be shortly appointed concurrently the director of the Baker Medical Research Institute which had been established in 1926 in affiliation with Alfred Hospital and on the same campus. This appointment became the apotheosis of his professional life. His intellectual quality and extensive training in clinical science and research that was just emerging in Australia made him highly eligible to be a leader and indeed one of the pioneers with distinguished contemporaries such as Sir Ian Wood at the Hall Institute. A young and enthusiastic group of physicians joined his staff on their way to notable academic and research careers - among them Joe Bornstein, Bryan Hudson, Priscilla Kincaid-Smith and Charlotte Anderson. All four were to gain chairs - two to become presidents of the College. On the Baker scientific staff Lowe had as associate director the notable haematologist Paul Fantl.

In addition to the newly appointed full-time research group Lowe attracted, and gave strong support to, a considerable number of Alfred Hospital honorary physicians and surgeons who worked part-time on research projects. Many of them made their mark as clinicians in cardiology, endocrinology and gastroenterology. The scientific insights thus gained were invaluable for their clinical practice and teaching. As well as these groups, Lowe's major research interest in cardiovascular diseases became the dominant theme in the Institute and this provided a base for the notable experimental backup for cardiac surgery. Sir James Officer Brown, Ken Morris and George Stirling with the expert collaboration of Alfred anaesthetists - Bob Orton and Geoffrey Kaye especially - established one of the pioneer Australian centres of cardiac surgery which depended heavily on the Baker Institute for experimental studies. Ted Kay and James Gardiner were chosen by Lowe to form the Cardiovascular Diagnostic Service which also provided the clinical cardiological backup. The symbiosis of the Baker and the Alfred – full-time and part-time - and the high standard of the research and clinical application which Lowe led and supported, has had its continuation in the development under Paul Korner, who succeeded Lowe, of a research unit of excellence devoted entirely to cardiovascular research. Lowe played a significant role in building bridges between the beds and the bench which profoundly affected the practice and teaching of medicine not only in Alfred Hospital but much more widely, as many of his staff were promoted to important clinical and research posts in Australia and overseas. Lowe's name appears as sole author of thirty-two scientific publications and as joint authorship of a further thirty. He was awarded the Bertram Armytage Prize for medical research in 1941 and co-winner of the Stawell Prize in 1949. He was elected FRCP in 1952.

In 1963 affiliation with Monash University which had opened in 1961 had his strong support and widened the opportunity of postgraduate appointments. Lowe was appointed to the Faculty of Medicine in 1961 and represented the Faculty on council until 1971. Lowe served with various research sponsoring bodies and committees - the Life Insurance Medical Research Fund, National Heart Foundation of Australia, president of the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand from 1964 1965 and the Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria - being appointed chairman of the executive of the Cancer Institute Board from 1971 to 1983. He was appointed a Commander of the British Empire in 1967. He was a foundation fellow of the College in 1938 and was a member of the Victorian state committee from 1950 to 1958 then honorary secretary from 1954 to 1956.

A major contribution by Lowe was his role in the rebuilding of the Baker Institute in two stages from 1966 to 1969. His general planning, design of laboratories and careful administration resulted in a first class building and well adapted to its next phase, on his retirement in 1974 as a centre exclusively for cardiovascular research. It is seldom that the sower and reaper is the same person but he left a bountiful young crop for his successor.

Tom married Elizabeth Ayleen Anderson in 1938. He had one son who graduated in medicine. Beth, a much loved woman by all her friends, gave Tom the added warmth and love he needed until she died in 1983 after many years of severe pain and disability from rheumatoid arthritis. Not many were aware of Tom's unfailing tenderness and continuing solicitude for Beth. In 1986 he married Jean Henry née York Syme. They enjoyed the happiest of marriages and companionship in his few remaining years. He died of a cardiac arrest a few days after a successful removal of a colonic neoplasm. Of the man himself, Tom gave the appearance of being somewhat aloof - not the easiest of men to know: perhaps this was part of his judicial genes - his objectivity, integrity and calm judgements. Once the barrier was passed Tom gave freely warmth and understanding and above all loyalty. He was a highly accomplished man who served medical science faithfully and well. He lived to see the fruits of his work and wisdom applied with great benefit for the community.