Gerald M. Edelman

Gerald Edelman
Gerald M. Edelman in 2010.
Born	Gerald Maurice Edelman (1929-07-01)July 1, 1929 Ozone Park, Queens, New York
Died	May 17, 2014(2014-05-17) (aged 84) La Jolla, California
Nationality	American
Fields	Immunology Neuroscience Philosophy of Mind
Alma mater	Ursinus College, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, The Rockefeller University
Notable awards	Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1972
Spouse	Maxine M. Morrison (m. 1950; 3 children)

Gerald Maurice Edelman (July 1, 1929 – May 17, 2014) was an American biologist who shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work with Rodney Robert Porter on the immune system. Edelman's Nobel Prize-winning research concerned discovery of the structure of antibody molecules. In interviews, he has said that the way the components of the immune system evolve over the life of the individual is analogous to the way the components of the brain evolve in a lifetime. There is a continuity in this way between his work on the immune system, for which he won the Nobel Prize, and his later work in neuroscience and in philosophy of mind.

Gerald Edelman was born in 1929 in Ozone Park, Queens, New York, to Jewish parents, physician Edward Edelman, and Anna (née Freedman) Edelman, who worked in the insurance industry. He studied violin for years, but eventually realized that he did not have the inner drive needed to pursue a career as a concert violinist, and decided to go into medical research instead. After being raised in New York, he attended college in Pennsylvania where he graduated magna cum laude with a B.S. from Ursinus College in 1950 and received an M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in 1954.

After a year at the Johnson Foundation for Medical Physics, Edelman became a resident at the Massachusetts General Hospital; he then practiced medicine in France while serving with US Army Medical Corps. In 1957, Edelman joined the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research as a graduate fellow, working in the laboratory of Henry Kunkel and receiving a Ph.D. in 1960. The institute made him the Assistant (later Associate) Dean of Graduate Studies; he became a professor at the school in 1966. In 1992, he moved to California and became a professor of neurobiology at The Scripps Research Institute.