Murdoch, Colin Albert

▪ 2009

      New Zealand pharmacist, veterinary chemist, and inventor

born Feb. 6, 1929, Christchurch, N.Z.

died May 4, 2008, Timaru, N.Z.

held patents on some 46 inventions, most notably the first disposable sterile prefilled hypodermic syringe, which he devised (1956) at age 27 while seeking an easier way to vaccinate animals. Murdoch offered his disposable plastic syringe to various New Zealand government departments, which rejected it as impractical, but within a few years his improved versions of the device had made daily injections of insulin safer and easier for millions of diabetics worldwide. His other inventions included a less-dangerous form of veterinary tranquilizer dart (plus various rifles and pistols with which to dispense the projectiles, along with advanced telescopic rangefinder sights), disposable automatic vaccinator syringes, silent automatic-dialing burglar alarms, heat-sensing cells for silent fire alarms, transmitter relocation darts, and the childproof medicine bottle cap, which earned him a gold medal at the 1976 World Inventors Fair in Brussels. Murdoch registered (1961) the international trade name Paxarms Ltd., but he repeatedly refused to defend his patents. He was made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2000. In August 2007 the tranquilizer gun was honoured on a New Zealand postage stamp.

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