Lloyd W. (Wayne) Tansey

Lloyd W. (Wayne) Tansey, 71, a chemist at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, died in Houston on Sept. 24 two years after a melanoma diagnosis.

Born in Beaumont, Texas, Tansey earned a B.A. in chemistry from Lamar University in 1961 and an M.A. in organic chemistry from Texas A&M University in 1965.

Early in his career, Tansey joined the Neurochemistry & Neuropharmacology Section of the Texas Research Institute of Mental Sciences, conducting research on mental health illnesses until the institute closed in 1985.

The following year, he became a senior research assistant in the Neuro-Oncology Department at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center. From 1988 until 1989, he also held a faculty position at the University of Houston, where he taught chemistry.

Tansey became a senior research assistant in M. D. Anderson’s department of nuclear medicine within its Division of Diagnostic Imaging in 1989. In this role, he was a pioneer in the use of positron emission tomography imaging technology, which helps in early detection of disease. Tansey is credited with two patents and more than 40 publications. He retired from M. D. Anderson in 2002.

Tansey was a member of the Society of Nuclear Medicine and was an emeritus member of ACS, having joined in 1961.

In addition to enjoying gardening, photography, and building computers, he was a member of the Houston Museum of Natural Science and the Houston Zoological Society. He had been a member of St. Paul’s United Methodist Church since 1965.

Tansey is survived by his wife of 48 years, Barbara; sons, Mark and Alan; daughter, Susan Thomas; and four grandchildren.