Anthony Emmanuel Mavrogordato, widely known as "Mavro", was a physiologist and medical researcher and the son of Emmanuel Antonios Mavrogordato and his wife Despina Ralli. He studied in the natural sciences at Trinity College, Oxford, and completed his medical studies at St Thomas's Hospital. London, where he did much pathological work. He qualified as a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England (MRCS) and a Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians (LRCP). Later he returned to Oxford and spent some time in the laboratory of J. S. Haldane at Trinity College and then lectured in physiology at St Thomas's Hospital. Among others he published "Experiments on the effects of dust inhalation" in the journal Epidemiology and Infection (1918).
In 1919, on Haldane's recommendation, Mavrogordato was appointed in the newly created Fellowship in Industrial Hygiene at the South African Institute for Medical Research. He was initially appointed for six month, but as a result of the value of his work was asked to remain and held the position until his retirement at the end of 1939. His brief was to investigate silicosis in miners; more specifically the physiological mechanisms of dust entry into the body, the effects of such dust on health, and methods for its removal. To this end he investigated conditions in the gold mines of the Witwatersrand, the size and other characteristics of dust particles (most particles that settled in the lungs were found to be smaller than about one micrometer), conducted animal experiments with different types of dust, particularly extensive experiments on silicosis with guinea pigs and later with vervet monkeys, studied the role of bacteria in silicosis, the pathology and histology of silicosis lesions, the association between dust inhalation and susceptibility to tuberculosis, and conducted statistical studies of the epidemiology of silicosis. He also investigated techniques for measuring dust concentration in the air and eliminating dust from the air, especially the use of water in this regard. His findings were reported in various reports of the South African Institute for Medical Research and in a number of articles in scientific journals, including "The mode of action of dust in relation to respiratory diseases" (South African Medical Journal, 1922), "Miners' Phthisis on the Rand" (with L. G. Irvine*, Journal of the Chemical, Metallurgical and Mining Society of South Africa, 1929) and "A grammar of Witwatersrand silicosis" (Ibid, 1940). He was a pioneer of industrial health in the South African Mining industry.
Mavrogordato was widely respected internationally, had an encyclopaedic general knowledge and spoke impeccable English. He was also a gourmet and wine connoisseur, competent in literature, poetry, art and music, a sports lover and an extremely courteous person who attracted visitors in all these fields. As a keen motorist he became an authority on routes and the quality of roads in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Zambia. He was not married. At various times he was president of the South African Boxing Association and Chairman of the Rand Club. When the British Association for the Advancement of Science met with its South African counterpart in South Africa in 1929 he served as joint vice-president of Section I (which included physiology). He became a member of the Chemical, Metallurgical and Mining Society of South Africa in 1929.
