Sidney W. Fox

Sidney Walter Fox
Sidney Walter Fox
Born	24 March 1912 Los Angeles
Died	10 August 1998 (1998-08-11) (aged 86)
Fields	Biochemistry
Known for	Microspheres

Sidney Walter Fox (24 March 1912 – 10 August 1998) was a Los Angeles-born biochemist responsible for discoveries on the origins of life. Fox explored the synthesis of amino acids from inorganic molecules, the synthesis of proteinous amino acids and amino acid polymers called "proteinoids" from inorganic molecules and thermal energy, and created what he thought was the world's first out of proteinoids and water. He called these globules "microspheres". Fox believed in the process of abiogenesis where life spontaneously organized itself from the colloquially known "primordial soup;" poolings of various simple organic molecules that existed during the time before life on Earth. He also suggested that his experiments possessed conditions that were similar to those of primordial Earth. In his experiments, he demonstrated that it is possible to create protein-like structures from inorganic molecules and thermal energy. Dr. Fox went on to create microspheres that he said closely resembled bacterial cells and concluded that they could be similar to the earliest forms of life or .

Sidney Fox was the son of Jacob Fox, a wig-maker, and Louise Berman, a Ukrainian immigrant. Fox married Raia Joffe Fox and they have three sons: Lawrence, Ronald, and Thomas. All three of his sons became scientists. His family was Jewish.

Fox obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree from University of California, Los Angeles in Chemistry. He went on to earn a Ph. D. from California Institute of Technology in 1940 and did his postdoctoral work at the Linus Pauling Laboratory where he grew close with Linus Pauling.

From 1943 to 1955, Fox was a full professor at Iowa State College. Fox became the head of the Iowa Agricultural Experimental Station's Chemistry Department from 1949 to 1955. In 1955, Sidney W. Fox moved to Florida State University and held the position of Professor of Chemistry, Director of the Oceanographic Institute, and Director of the Institute for Space Biosciences. In 1964, Dr. Fox moved to the University of Miami where he was a professor and the director of the Institute for Molecular Evolution for 25 years. The program was supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Dr. Fox also taught at the Southern Illinois University in the Department of Plant Biology as a Distinguished Research Professor. From there, Fox moved to the University of South Alabama where he was entitled Distinguished Research Scientist in the Marine Sciences department in 1993.