In a 1902 article written for the British medical journal Lancet, the English scientist John Beard, at the time Professor at the University of Edinburgh, first proposed that the pancreatic enzyme trypsin represents the body’s primary defense against cancer and would be useful as a cancer treatment. Beard came to his conclusion as the result of some 20 years of hard laboratory research, that today holds up to rigorous scientific scrutiny. Despite his documentation and his impeccable reputation—he would be nominated for the Nobel Prize in 1905 for his work in embryology—the vast majority of cancer experts categorically rejected Beard’s thesis outright.