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George Wald

January 01, 1970

George Wald (November 18, 1906 – April 12, 1997) was an American scientist and activist who studied pigments in the retina. He won a share of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Haldan Keffer Hartline and Ragnar Granit.[1]

George Wald
George Wald in 1987
Born
George Wald

(1906-11-18)November 18, 1906
New York, New York, U.S.
DiedApril 12, 1997(1997-04-12) (aged 90)
Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.
Alma materNew York University
Columbia University
Known forPigments in the retina Wald's visual cycle
Spouses
  • Frances Kingsley (m. 1931; div. ?) (1906-1980)
​
(m. 1958)​
(1924-2016)
Children4
AwardsEli Lilly Award in Biological Chemistry (1939)
Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research (1953)
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1967)
Scientific career
FieldsNeurobiology
InstitutionsHarvard University
University of Chicago

In 1970, Wald predicted that “civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.”[2][3][4]

Research edit

 
Wald plotted the absorbance of rod pigment (black curve), then later the absorbance of cone pigments (red, green, and blue curves)

As a postdoctoral researcher, Wald discovered that vitamin A was a component of the retina. His further experiments showed that when the pigment rhodopsin was exposed to light, it yielded the protein opsin and a compound containing vitamin A. This suggested that vitamin A was essential in retinal function.

In the 1950s, Wald and his colleagues used chemical methods to extract pigments from the retina. Then, using a spectrophotometer, they were able to measure the light absorbance of the pigments. Since the absorbance of light by retina pigments corresponds to the wavelengths that best activate photoreceptor cells, this experiment showed the wavelengths that the eye could best detect. However, since rod cells make up most of the retina, what Wald and his colleagues were specifically measuring was the absorbance of rhodopsin, the main photopigment in rods. Later, with a technique called microspectrophotometry, he was able to measure the absorbance directly from cells, rather than from an extract of the pigments. This allowed Wald to determine the absorbance of pigments in the cone cells (Goldstein, 2001).

Biography edit

 
George Wald with wife Ruth Hubbard in 1967

George Wald was born in New York City, the son of Ernestine (Rosenmann) and Isaac Wald, Jewish immigrant parents. He was a member of the first graduating class of the Brooklyn Technical High School in New York in 1923. He received his Bachelor of Science degree from New York University in 1927 and his PhD in zoology from Columbia University in 1932. After graduating, he received a travel grant from the US National Research Council. Wald used this grant to work in Germany with Otto Heinrich Warburg where he identified vitamin A in the retina. Wald then went on to work in Zürich, Switzerland with the discoverer of vitamin A, Paul Karrer. Wald then worked briefly with Otto Fritz Meyerhof in Heidelberg, Germany, but left Europe for the University of Chicago in 1933 when Adolf Hitler came to power and life in Europe became more dangerous for Jews. In 1934, Wald went to Harvard University where he became an instructor, then a professor.

Wald was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1948.[5] He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1950, the American Philosophical Society in 1958,[6] and in 1967 was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries in vision. In 1966 he was awarded the Frederic Ives Medal by the OSA and in 1967 the Paul Karrer Gold Medal of the University of Zurich.[7]

Wald discussing the likelihood of life on other planets in Who's Out There? (1973).

Wald spoke out on many political and social issues and his fame as a Nobel laureate brought national and international attention to his views. He was a pacifist and vocal opponent of the Vietnam War and the nuclear arms race. Speaking at MIT in 1969 Wald said, "Our government has become preoccupied with death, with the business of killing and being killed."[8] In 1980, Wald served as part of Ramsey Clark's delegation to Iran during the Iran hostage crisis.

With a small number of other Nobel laureates, he was invited in 1986 to fly to Moscow to advise Mikhail Gorbachev on a number of environmental questions. While there, he questioned Gorbachev about the arrest, detention and exile of Yelena Bonner and her husband, fellow Nobel laureate Andrei Sakharov (Peace prize, 1975). Wald reported that Gorbachev said he knew nothing about it. Bonner and Sakharov were released shortly thereafter, in December 1986.

A member of the Circumcision resource center in Boston, he was one of the first scientists committed against circumcision but his article "Circumcision", rejected by the New York Times in 1975, was published in 2012 only by an English magazine (http://churchandstate.org.uk/2012/12/what-jewish-nobelist-george-wald-had-to-say-about-circumcision/ September 21, 2020, at the Wayback Machine).

Wald died in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was married twice: in 1931 to Frances Kingsley (1906–1980) and in 1958 to the biochemist Ruth Hubbard. He had two sons with Kingsley—Michael and David; he and Hubbard had a son—the award-winning musicologist and musician Elijah Wald—and a daughter, Deborah, a prominent family law attorney. He was an atheist.[9][unreliable source?]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ The Nobel Foundation. "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1967". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Retrieved December 12, 2015.
  2. ^ Walter E. Williams (2015). American Contempt for Liberty. Hoover Institution Press. p. 374. ISBN 978-0817918750. Retrieved November 15, 2021.
  3. ^ Mark J. Perry (April 21, 2015) 18 spectacularly wrong apocalyptic predictions made around the time of the first Earth Day in 1970, expect more this year. aei.org
  4. ^ "The End of Civilization Feared by Biochemist". The New York Times. November 19, 1970. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 24, 2022.
  5. ^ "George Wald". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved December 16, 2022.
  6. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved December 16, 2022.
  7. ^ . University of Zurich. Archived from the original on July 21, 2015. Retrieved December 5, 2015.
  8. ^ Norman Solomon (September 6, 2010) . zcommunications.org
  9. ^ Donald E. Johnson (2010). Programming of Life. Big Mac Publishers. p. 123. ISBN 9780982355466. Biologist George Wald dismissed anything besides physicalism with, "I will not believe that philosophically because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore, I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible: spontaneous generation arising to evolution.

Further reading edit

  • Goldstein, B. 2001. Sensation and Perception, 6th ed. London: Wadsworth.
  • Dowling, John E (December 2002). "George Wald, 18 November 1906 – 12 April 1997". Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society. 146 (4). United States: 431–9. ISSN 0003-049X. PMID 12619664.
  • Hubbard, R; Wald E (2007). "George Wald Memorial Talk". Novartis Foundation Symposium 224 - Rhodopsins and Phototransduction. Novartis Foundation Symposia. Vol. 224. England. pp. 5–18, discussion 18–20. doi:10.1002/9780470515693.ch2. ISBN 9780470515693. ISSN 1528-2511. PMID 10614043.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  • Raju, T N (August 1999). "The Nobel Chronicles. 1967: George Wald (1906–97); Ragnar A Granit (1900–91); and Haldan Keffer Hartline (1903–83)". Lancet. 354 (9178). England: 605. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(05)77968-X. ISSN 0140-6736. PMID 10470741. S2CID 53297408.
  • Jukes, T H (July 1997). "George Wald believed in apocalypse now". Nature. 388 (6637). England: 13. Bibcode:1997Natur.388S..13.. doi:10.1038/40251. PMID 9214489. S2CID 205027479.
  • Dowling, J E (May 1997). "George Wald (1906–97)". Nature. 387 (6631). England: 356. Bibcode:1997Natur.387..356D. doi:10.1038/387356a0. PMID 9163416. S2CID 4322440.
  • "Nutrition classics. The Journal of General Physiology, Volume eighteenth 1935: Vitamin A in eye tissues. By George Wald". Nutr. Rev. 43 (8). United States: 244–6. August 1985. doi:10.1111/j.1753-4887.1985.tb02437.x. ISSN 0029-6643. PMID 3900823. S2CID 1091402.
  • Dowling, J E; Wald G (March 1981). "Nutrition classics. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Volume 46, 1960: The biological function of vitamin A acid: John E. Dowling and George Wald". Nutr. Rev. 39 (3). United States: 134–8. doi:10.1111/j.1753-4887.1981.tb06752.x. ISSN 0029-6643. PMID 7027100.
  • Sulek, K (July 1969). "Nobel prize for George Wald, Haldan Keffer Hartline and Ragner Granit in 1967 for discoveries concerning the primary biochemical and physiological phenomena occurring in the process of vision". Wiad. Lek. 22 (13). Poland: 1258–9. ISSN 0043-5147. PMID 4897321.
  • Bouman, M A (January 1968). "Ragnar Garnit, Haldan Keffer Hartline, George Wald, winners of the Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine". Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde. 112 (1). Netherlands: 23–5. ISSN 0028-2162. PMID 4875782.
  • Mikulski, T; Zaki El-Sabban, M.; Zwolinski, Bruno J. (1968). "Noble laureate prize in the field of medicine for 1967: G. Wald, R. Granit, and H. K. Hartline". Postepy Biochem. 14 (3). Poland: 473. Bibcode:1968MolPh..14..473K. doi:10.1080/00268976800100591. ISSN 0032-5422. PMID 4879756.
  • Dowling, J E; Ratliff F (October 1967). "Nobel prize: 3 named for medicine, physiology award (George Wald, Ragnar Granit and Haldan Keffer Hartline)". Science. 158 (3800). United States: 468–73. Bibcode:1967Sci...158..468D. doi:10.1126/science.158.3800.468. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 4860394. S2CID 177926314.
  • "George Wald". Am. J. Ophthalmol. 40 (5 Part 2): 4–7. November 1955. ISSN 0002-9394. PMID 13268547.

External links edit

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to George Wald.
  • George Wald on Nobelprize.org  
  • John E. Dowling, "George Wald, 1906–1997: A Biographical Memoir" in Biographical Memoirs, Washington, D.C.: The National Academy Press (National Academy of Sciences), Volume 78, 298:317.
  • A remembrance by his son Elijah
  • Papers of George Wald : an inventory

Two of George Wald's speeches can be read on-line:

  • A Generation in Search of a Future
  • The Origin of Death

January 01, 1970
george, wald, this, article, multiple, issues, please, help, improve, discuss, these, issues, talk, page, learn, when, remove, these, template, messages, this, article, needs, additional, citations, verification, please, help, improve, this, article, adding, c. This article has multiple issues Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page Learn how and when to remove these template messages This article needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources George Wald news newspapers books scholar JSTOR February 2013 Learn how and when to remove this template message This article includes a list of general references but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations December 2015 Learn how and when to remove this template message Learn how and when to remove this template message George Wald November 18 1906 April 12 1997 was an American scientist and activist who studied pigments in the retina He won a share of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Haldan Keffer Hartline and Ragnar Granit 1 George WaldGeorge Wald in 1987BornGeorge Wald 1906 11 18 November 18 1906New York New York U S DiedApril 12 1997 1997 04 12 aged 90 Cambridge Massachusetts U S Alma materNew York UniversityColumbia UniversityKnown forPigments in the retina Wald s visual cycleSpousesFrances Kingsley m 1931 div 1906 1980 Ruth Hubbard m 1958 wbr 1924 2016 Children4AwardsEli Lilly Award in Biological Chemistry 1939 Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research 1953 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1967 Scientific careerFieldsNeurobiologyInstitutionsHarvard UniversityUniversity of Chicago In 1970 Wald predicted that civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind 2 3 4 Contents 1 Research 2 Biography 3 See also 4 References 5 Further reading 6 External linksResearch edit nbsp Wald plotted the absorbance of rod pigment black curve then later the absorbance of cone pigments red green and blue curves As a postdoctoral researcher Wald discovered that vitamin A was a component of the retina His further experiments showed that when the pigment rhodopsin was exposed to light it yielded the protein opsin and a compound containing vitamin A This suggested that vitamin A was essential in retinal function In the 1950s Wald and his colleagues used chemical methods to extract pigments from the retina Then using a spectrophotometer they were able to measure the light absorbance of the pigments Since the absorbance of light by retina pigments corresponds to the wavelengths that best activate photoreceptor cells this experiment showed the wavelengths that the eye could best detect However since rod cells make up most of the retina what Wald and his colleagues were specifically measuring was the absorbance of rhodopsin the main photopigment in rods Later with a technique called microspectrophotometry he was able to measure the absorbance directly from cells rather than from an extract of the pigments This allowed Wald to determine the absorbance of pigments in the cone cells Goldstein 2001 Biography edit nbsp George Wald with wife Ruth Hubbard in 1967 George Wald was born in New York City the son of Ernestine Rosenmann and Isaac Wald Jewish immigrant parents He was a member of the first graduating class of the Brooklyn Technical High School in New York in 1923 He received his Bachelor of Science degree from New York University in 1927 and his PhD in zoology from Columbia University in 1932 After graduating he received a travel grant from the US National Research Council Wald used this grant to work in Germany with Otto Heinrich Warburg where he identified vitamin A in the retina Wald then went on to work in Zurich Switzerland with the discoverer of vitamin A Paul Karrer Wald then worked briefly with Otto Fritz Meyerhof in Heidelberg Germany but left Europe for the University of Chicago in 1933 when Adolf Hitler came to power and life in Europe became more dangerous for Jews In 1934 Wald went to Harvard University where he became an instructor then a professor Wald was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1948 5 He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1950 the American Philosophical Society in 1958 6 and in 1967 was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries in vision In 1966 he was awarded the Frederic Ives Medal by the OSA and in 1967 the Paul Karrer Gold Medal of the University of Zurich 7 source source source source Wald discussing the likelihood of life on other planets in Who s Out There 1973 Wald spoke out on many political and social issues and his fame as a Nobel laureate brought national and international attention to his views He was a pacifist and vocal opponent of the Vietnam War and the nuclear arms race Speaking at MIT in 1969 Wald said Our government has become preoccupied with death with the business of killing and being killed 8 In 1980 Wald served as part of Ramsey Clark s delegation to Iran during the Iran hostage crisis With a small number of other Nobel laureates he was invited in 1986 to fly to Moscow to advise Mikhail Gorbachev on a number of environmental questions While there he questioned Gorbachev about the arrest detention and exile of Yelena Bonner and her husband fellow Nobel laureate Andrei Sakharov Peace prize 1975 Wald reported that Gorbachev said he knew nothing about it Bonner and Sakharov were released shortly thereafter in December 1986 A member of the Circumcision resource center in Boston he was one of the first scientists committed against circumcision but his article Circumcision rejected by the New York Times in 1975 was published in 2012 only by an English magazine http churchandstate org uk 2012 12 what jewish nobelist george wald had to say about circumcision Archived September 21 2020 at the Wayback Machine Wald died in Cambridge Massachusetts He was married twice in 1931 to Frances Kingsley 1906 1980 and in 1958 to the biochemist Ruth Hubbard He had two sons with Kingsley Michael and David he and Hubbard had a son the award winning musicologist and musician Elijah Wald and a daughter Deborah a prominent family law attorney He was an atheist 9 unreliable source See also editList of Jewish Nobel laureates RetinalReferences edit The Nobel Foundation The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1967 Nobelprize org Nobel Media AB 2014 Retrieved December 12 2015 Walter E Williams 2015 American Contempt for Liberty Hoover Institution Press p 374 ISBN 978 0817918750 Retrieved November 15 2021 Mark J Perry April 21 2015 18 spectacularly wrong apocalyptic predictions made around the time of the first Earth Day in 1970 expect more this year aei org The End of Civilization Feared by Biochemist The New York Times November 19 1970 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved May 24 2022 George Wald American Academy of Arts amp Sciences Retrieved December 16 2022 APS Member History search amphilsoc org Retrieved December 16 2022 List of Recipients University of Zurich Archived from the original on July 21 2015 Retrieved December 5 2015 Norman Solomon September 6 2010 A Speech for Endless War zcommunications org Donald E Johnson 2010 Programming of Life Big Mac Publishers p 123 ISBN 9780982355466 Biologist George Wald dismissed anything besides physicalism with I will not believe that philosophically because I do not want to believe in God Therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible spontaneous generation arising to evolution Further reading editGoldstein B 2001 Sensation and Perception 6th ed London Wadsworth Dowling John E December 2002 George Wald 18 November 1906 12 April 1997 Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 146 4 United States 431 9 ISSN 0003 049X PMID 12619664 Hubbard R Wald E 2007 George Wald Memorial Talk Novartis Foundation Symposium 224 Rhodopsins and Phototransduction Novartis Foundation Symposia Vol 224 England pp 5 18 discussion 18 20 doi 10 1002 9780470515693 ch2 ISBN 9780470515693 ISSN 1528 2511 PMID 10614043 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Raju T N August 1999 The Nobel Chronicles 1967 George Wald 1906 97 Ragnar A Granit 1900 91 and Haldan Keffer Hartline 1903 83 Lancet 354 9178 England 605 doi 10 1016 S0140 6736 05 77968 X ISSN 0140 6736 PMID 10470741 S2CID 53297408 Jukes T H July 1997 George Wald believed in apocalypse now Nature 388 6637 England 13 Bibcode 1997Natur 388S 13 doi 10 1038 40251 PMID 9214489 S2CID 205027479 Dowling J E May 1997 George Wald 1906 97 Nature 387 6631 England 356 Bibcode 1997Natur 387 356D doi 10 1038 387356a0 PMID 9163416 S2CID 4322440 Nutrition classics The Journal of General Physiology Volume eighteenth 1935 Vitamin A in eye tissues By George Wald Nutr Rev 43 8 United States 244 6 August 1985 doi 10 1111 j 1753 4887 1985 tb02437 x ISSN 0029 6643 PMID 3900823 S2CID 1091402 Dowling J E Wald G March 1981 Nutrition classics Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Volume 46 1960 The biological function of vitamin A acid John E Dowling and George Wald Nutr Rev 39 3 United States 134 8 doi 10 1111 j 1753 4887 1981 tb06752 x ISSN 0029 6643 PMID 7027100 Sulek K July 1969 Nobel prize for George Wald Haldan Keffer Hartline and Ragner Granit in 1967 for discoveries concerning the primary biochemical and physiological phenomena occurring in the process of vision Wiad Lek 22 13 Poland 1258 9 ISSN 0043 5147 PMID 4897321 Bouman M A January 1968 Ragnar Garnit Haldan Keffer Hartline George Wald winners of the Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde 112 1 Netherlands 23 5 ISSN 0028 2162 PMID 4875782 Mikulski T Zaki El Sabban M Zwolinski Bruno J 1968 Noble laureate prize in the field of medicine for 1967 G Wald R Granit and H K Hartline Postepy Biochem 14 3 Poland 473 Bibcode 1968MolPh 14 473K doi 10 1080 00268976800100591 ISSN 0032 5422 PMID 4879756 Dowling J E Ratliff F October 1967 Nobel prize 3 named for medicine physiology award George Wald Ragnar Granit and Haldan Keffer Hartline Science 158 3800 United States 468 73 Bibcode 1967Sci 158 468D doi 10 1126 science 158 3800 468 ISSN 0036 8075 PMID 4860394 S2CID 177926314 George Wald Am J Ophthalmol 40 5 Part 2 4 7 November 1955 ISSN 0002 9394 PMID 13268547 External links edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to George Wald George Wald on Nobelprize org nbsp John E Dowling George Wald 1906 1997 A Biographical Memoir in Biographical Memoirs Washington D C The National Academy Press National Academy of Sciences Volume 78 298 317 A remembrance by his son Elijah Papers of George Wald an inventory Two of George Wald s speeches can be read on line A Generation in Search of a Future The Origin of Death Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title George Wald amp oldid 1207599556, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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