Andrei belozersky (1905)

Belozersky was born in August 1905 in Tashkent. He completed his undergraduate studies at Tashkent University in 1927. From 1927 to 1930 he was a postgraduate student. In 1930 he became assistant in the plant biochemistry department of Moscow University. A. N. Belozersky became associate professor in 1932, full professor in 1947, and head of the department in 1960. In 1965 he set up and headed a research laboratory of organic biochemistry. In 1958 he was elected corresponding member and in 1962 full member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

The main fields of Belozersky’s research were nucleic acids and nucleoproteins of plants and bacteria. He started his research in the early 1930s. Belozersky’s work was to prove the presence of DNA and to establish the presence and type of nucleic acids in microorganisms, and particular in bacteria.

The analysis showed a correlation between the age and the biological activity of the cell on the one hand and the age and the amount of nucleic acids in the cell on the other. Already in 1957 he predicted the existence of a messenger RNA. In late 1940s Belozersky investigated several antibiotics.

Konrad bloch (1912-2000) The Nobel Prize Winner

Konrad E. Bloch was born on 21st January 1912, in Neisse, Germany. He attended the elementary school and the Real gymnasium in the same city and in 1930 went to Munich to study chemistry at the Technische Hochschule. He became soon attracted to organic chemistry.

For racial reasons his studies in Munich ended in 1934 after he had obtained the degree of Diplom-Ingenieur in Chemistry. Leaving Germany Bloch was fortunate to find a temporary position at the Schweizerische Forschungsinstitut in Davos, Switzerland. His assignment there was to investigate the phospholipids of tubercle bacilli, his first exposure to biochemical research.

In 1936 Bloch was able to immigrate to the United States as he had long hoped. He entered the Department of Biochemistry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University, where he became a graduate student. Research leading to the Ph.D. degree was completed in 1938. Rudolf Schoenheimer then asked Bloch to join his research group. This period developed his lasting interest in intermediary metabolism and problems of biosynthesis. During that time (in 1942) Bloch in collaboration with David Rittenberg initiated the work on the biological synthesis of cholesterol which was to occupy his research interests for nearly twenty years.

In 1946 Bloch moved to the University of Chicago as Assistant Professor of Biochemistry. Appointments to Associate Professor and Professor followed in 1948 and 1950, respectively. Work on cholesterol, biosynthesis was continued and progressed well with the aid of able and enthusiastic students.

In 1954 Bloch was appointed Professor of Biochemistry in the Department of Chemistry, Harvard University, and in 1968 he became Chairman of the Department. He became interested in the enzymatic formation of unsaturated fatty acids and more recently in various aspects of biochemical evolution. Later he was awarded the Nobel Prize.

Professor Bloch was President of the American Society of Biological Chemists (1967), Chairman of the Section of Biochemistry, National Academy of Sciences (1966-1969), and Chairman of the National Committee for the International Union of Biochemistry (1968). He held honorary doctor degrees from the universities of Uruguay (1966), Brazil (1966), Columbia University (1967), Technische Hochschule,

Munich (1968), and Brandeis University (1970).

In 1941 Konrad Bloch married a native of Munich. They had two children.

Konrad Bloch died on October 15, 2000.