Nobel Prize

Jacques Lucien Monod was born in Paris on February 9th, 1910. In 1917 his parents settled in the South of France, where Monod spent his early years, and he therefore thinks of himself as a Southerner rather than as a Parisian. His father was a painter, something of an unusual vocation for a Huguenot family…

The beginning is distant, and was a time when we as a people were without much of the fruits of science that now refine our lives. But it was also a good time, when family and town were the domain of our existence. My father of Scottish, and mother of German extraction, migrated with their…

Ttranslation from the German text Born in Berlin in 1897. Doctorate and University Teaching Thesis in Marburg/Lahn from the Faculty of Chemistry. Head of Department at Braunschweig (Technical College) from 1932; Associate Professor at Freiburg/Brsg. from 1937; Professor and Faculty Director at the Institute of Chemistry, Tübingen, from 1944; turned down the same position as…

Francis William Aston was born in September 1877 at Harborne, Birmingham, England, the third of a family of seven children. He was educated at Harborne Vicarage School and Malvern College where his interest in science was aroused. In 1894 he entered Mason College, Birmingham (later to become the University of Birmingham) where he studied chemistry…

I was born in Pusan, Korea, on October 3, 1904. My father Brede Pedersen, was a Norwegian marine engineer who left home as a young man and shipped out as an engineer on a steam freighter to the Far East. He eventually arrived in Korea and joined the fleet of the Korean customs service, which…

I was born on September 30, 1943 in Zusamaltheim, Bavaria, now Federal Republic of Germany, as the first son of Thekla and Johann Deisenhofer. After my father’s return from military service my parents ran the family farm. In 1948, our family grew to its final size with the birth of my only sister, Antonie. My…

John Charles Polanyi was born in 1929 in Berlin, Germany, of Hungarian parents, Michael and Magda Elizabeth Polanyi. The family moved to England in 1933 where he received his education. His University training was at Manchester University, where he obtained his B.Sc. in 1949, and his Ph.D. in 1952. From 1952-1954, he was a Postdoctoral…

I was born in Ludwigsburg, Württemberg, in the southwestern part of the Federal Republic of Germany on July 18, 1948, as the elder son of Karl and Frieda Michel. My ancestors lived in that area for generations, mainly as farmers. There the inherited land is equally divided among sisters and brothers, and not enough land…

Adolf Windaus was born in Berlin on December 25, 1876, the son of Adolf Windaus and Margarete Elster. His ancestors had for generations mostly been artisans (from his father’s side, drapery manufacturers). After attending the renowned “Französisches Gymnasium” (French grammar school) in Berlin, where his interests were mainly focussed on literature, he took up medicine…

I was born in New York on June 30, 1926 and my formative years were spent in a small, gated community named Sea Gate, at the southernmost tip of Brooklyn. By the time I reached Jr. high school I had already formed a strong ambition to be a scientist, in part stimulated by my readings…