Sir Anthony Carlisle (1768-1841), English surgeon and physicist. Carlisle was born near Durham. He studied medicine at Durham and at Westminster before qualifying as a surgeon. He wrote several papers on muscular motion and in 1800 started research with Nicholson on voltaic electricity. Nicholson credited Carlisle with the first observation of the decomposition of water by an electric current. As a result Calisle was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. In later years Carlisle became more interested with the arts and their connection with anatomy, although he was a prominent fund-raiser for the new buildings of Westminster Hospital.