Thanks to his time at the Dunn School, immunology became a lifelong passion and his research interests spanned parasitic infection, inflammation and obesity related liver damage.
Born on 14 April 1944 in Leonora, Western Australia, Graham attended state schools – Kenwick Primary and Kent Street High School – followed by medical school at the University of Western Australia. He was based in Oxford between 1965 – 77 and completed his Honours degree in physiology supported by a prestigious University of Oxford Commonwealth Medical Scholarship. A DPhil at the Dunn School followed, supervised by Professor Henry Harris. After finishing his studies he worked as a postdoc in Professor Jim Gowans’ group.
Graham remained in contact with the Dunn School after his move back to Australia in 1977. Back on home soil he took up a research post in Perth at the Princess Margaret Hospital Medical Research Foundation (now TKI), followed by an appointment to the University of Adelaide’s Department of Microbiology and Immunology.
Outside the lab gardening and bushwalking were hobbies, and also running thorough which he met his first wife Judy with whom he had two children Marshall and Tasmin.
Sarah and Michael, twins from his second marriage, also survive him as does second wife, Adele, his grandchildren, and sister Maxine Pendal.
Members of the Dunn School community past and present convey their condolences to Graham’s family, friends and colleagues.
An obituary of Graham Mayrhofer’s life was published in ‘The West Australian’ newspaper on 10 February 2017.