Frederick Chapman Robbins was an American paediatrician and virologist who, along with John Franklin Enders and Thomas Huckle Weller, won the 1954 Nobel Prize in Medicine. The trio was awarded for their discovery of the ability of poliomyelitis viruses to grow in cultures of various types of tissue. This was a revolutionary discovery of that time as it helped to grow the virus in test tube and in turn develop a vaccine that eventually has eliminated the crippling disease from most of the countries across the globe. The breakthrough work in isolation and growth of the polio virus had expansive dividends. The tissue culture technique developed helped isolate increasing number of viruses of infectious disease and also had important implications for cancer. Apart from his scientific career, Robbins played a crucial role as an academic leader as well. He served as President of the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine and as Professor Emeritus of Case Western Reserve Medical School.