 In 1928, HB and MC Maitland grew vaccinia virus in suspensions of minced hens' kidneys.Their method was not widely adopted until the 1950s, when poliovirus was grown on a large scale for vaccine production.In 1941–42, George Hirst (1909–94) developed assays based on haemagglutination to quantify a wide range of viruses as well as virus-specific antibodies in serum.