Best, Charles Herbert, 1899-1978, Canadian physiologist, b. West Pembroke, Maine. With F. G. Banting he discovered (1921) the use of insulin in the treatment of diabetes. He was appointed professor of physiology at the Univ. of Toronto in 1929, served as associate director of the Connaught Laboratories from 1932 to 1941, and became director of the Banting and Best department of medical research at the Univ. of Toronto in 1941. With N. B. Taylor he wrote The Living Body (rev. ed. 1946), The Physiological Basis of Medical Practice (4th ed. 1946), and The Human Body and Its Functions (3d ed. 1956).

Dr. Charles Herbert Best, CC (February 27, 1899 – March 31, 1978) was a medical scientist. He was born in West Pembroke, Maine, Washington County United States to Canadian parents.

As a 22-year-old medical student at the University of Toronto he worked as an assistant to Dr. Frederick Banting and played a major role in the discovery of the pancreatic hormone insulin—one of the most significant advances in medicine, enabling an effective treatment for diabetes.

In 1923, the Nobel Prize committee honoured Banting and J.J.R. Macleod with the Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery of insulin, ignoring Best. This incensed Banting, who voluntarily shared half of his award money with Best.

Best succeeded Macleod as professor of physiology at University of Toronto in 1929. During World War II he was influential in establishing a Canadian programme for securing and using dried human blood serum. In his later years, Best was an adviser to the medical research committee of the United Nations World Health Organization.

In 1967 he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada. In 1994 he was inducted into the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame. In 2004, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Dr. Charles Best Secondary School in Coquitlam, British Columbia, C.H. Best West Elementary School in Burlington, Ontario, and C.H. Best East Middle School in Toronto, Ontario, are named in his honour.

Best married Margaret Hooper Mahon in Toronto in 1924. They had two sons.

Charles Best is interred in Mount Pleasant Cemetery, Toronto.

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