London

Jacques Benveniste, the French immunologist who claimed that water has a ‘memory’ — a putative explanation for homeopathic medicine — died on 3 October in Paris after heart surgery. He was 69 years old.

Benveniste was a maverick whose theories on molecular signalling in cell biology were dismissed by many other researchers. Yet his charm, charisma and rhetorical flair earned him a large following in France, and he remained genuinely convinced that he had discovered something important.

Much of his celebrity sprang from a Nature paper in 1988 — published with an unusual rider from John Maddox, the journal's editor at that time, pointing out that, at face value, the findings were unbelievable (see Nature 333, 816–818; 1988). According to Benveniste's paper, water that had once contained biomolecules, but had been diluted until it was devoid of any active agents, could still have a biological effect. The paper described white blood cells involved in allergic responses being activated by such a solution of antibodies.

At the time, Benveniste was research director of the Clamart-based Unit 200 of INSERM, the French biomedical research agency, which studied the immunology of allergy and inflammation. He was temporarily suspended after Maddox launched an investigation of his methods with the help of fraud investigator Walter Stewart and stage magician James Randi. Benveniste complained that this amounted to a “Salem witch hunt”.

Although Benveniste's results were widely disbelieved by scientists and were not reproduced elsewhere, they were hailed in the popular press as a validation of homeopathy. The ‘memory of water’ was never clearly explained; Benveniste suggested that quantum-mechanical effects might be involved.

Benveniste continued to investigate biomolecular behaviour at high dilution, and concluded that molecular signalling occurs by electromagnetic transmission. He published claims that he had induced cell responses by playing back digitally recorded molecular signals in the absence of the molecules.

Although he kept up an association with INSERM, his studies during the past decade were conducted primarily at his privately funded Digital Biology Laboratory in Clamart.