Physiology or Medicine

Biographical

Tadeus Reichstein was born on July 20th, 1897, at Wloclawek, Poland. He was the son of Isidor Reichstein and Gastava Brockmann. After passing his early childhood at Kiev, where his father was an engineer, Reichstein was educated, first at a boarding-school at Jena and later, when his family moved to Zurich (where he was naturalized),…

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Speed read

Looking back over the two discoveries rewarded with the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine reveals two different timelines for discovery research. One, Harald zur Hausen’s realization that subtypes of a virus that produces harmless warts can also lead to cervical cancer, took a decade of work to prove, initially against a backdrop of…

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Biographical

Philip Showalter Hench was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on February 28, 1896, the son of Jacob Bixler Hench and Clara Showalter. After attending local schools he entered Lafayette College, Easton, Penn., where he graduated Bachelor of Arts in 1916. He enlisted in the Medical Corps of the United States Army in 1917 but was transferred…

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Banquet speech

Niels K. Jerne’s speech at the Nobel Banquet, December 10, 1984 Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, The Nobel Prize is a precious gift, and it is wonderful to receive this gift rather late in life: one does not then have to carry for a very long time the burden that this…

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