Leo Loeb

Leo Loeb
Leo Loeb, MD, in 1915.
Born	September 21, 1869 Mayen, Prussia (Germany)
Died	December 28, 1959(1959-12-28) (aged 90) St. Louis, Missouri, United States
Residence	St. Louis, Missouri
Citizenship	United States
Nationality	German; American
Fields	Medicine & Pathology
Institutions	Washington University in St. Louis, McGill University, University of Chicago, University of Illinois at Chicago, University of Pennsylvania
Alma mater	University of Zurich
Known for	Research on cancer & endocrinology

Leo Loeb (September 21, 1869 – December 28, 1959), was an American physician, educator, and experimental pathologist.

Loeb, son of a Jewish family from the German Eifel region, was born in 1869 in Mayen, Prussia. He was orphaned as a child and grew up in the care of an uncle. Because of ill health, Leo was educated in schools that were located in German "spa" towns. As a teenager, he enrolled at the University of Heidelberg, but his tenure there was short. Indeed, over the succeeding couple of years, he spent only brief periods at several universities, in Berlin, Freiburg, and Basel, unable to focus his interests. Finally, in 1890, Loeb entered the University of Zurich Medical School. This time he remained in place, except for external sojourns to Edinburgh, London, and the United States for external clinical experiences. Leo received his M.D. in 1897. For his senior thesis, he had done research on skin transplantation in animals; that experience, combined with the influence of his older brother, Jacques, who was a physiologist, led Loeb to decide to pursue a career in experimental medicine.

His brother had a teaching position at the University of Chicago, and Leo moved to that city from Europe after completing his medical degree. Following a brief period of practicing clinical medicine—which he disliked—Loeb took a position as a lecturer at the College of Medicine of the University of Illinois) and the University of Chicago. At those institutions, he taught experimental methodology, and, at intervals, was also a visiting scholar at Johns Hopkins University. Loeb became interested in blood coagulation and the growth properties of malignant cells. As an outgrowth of the latter topic, Loeb developed the cell culture technique as applied to both normal and abnormal tissues.