Robert Dyer Lyons (I 826-1886), microscopist, meteorologist, physician, parliamentarian

When the attention of Robert Dyer Lyons was drawn to the medical value of the microscope in 1850, he trained himself in its use, and after annually reviewing its recent discoveries he was despatched as chief pathologist to the Army of the East in April 1855. His Report (1856) was a feather in his cap when he returned from the Crimea to Dublin and took up a professorship in the recently founded Catholic University medical school. Popularity as a teacher and success as a physician broadened his interests to national affairs, and he advocated increased funding for university education and re-afforestation. He was elected a Liberal M P for Dublin in 1880 but did not stand for re-election in 1886, the year of his death.