Biography
Sydney Brenner CH FRS FMedSci MAE (13 January 1927 – 5 April 2019) [ 13 ] [ 14 ] was a South African biologist . In 2002, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with H. Robert Horvitz and Sir John E. Sulston . [ 10 ] Brenner made significant contributions to work on the genetic code , and other areas of molecular biology while working in the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge , England. He established the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans as a model organism for the investigation of developmental biology , [ 11 ] [ 15 ] and founded the Molecular Sciences Institute in Berkeley, California , United States. [ 16 ] [ 17 ] [ 18 ] [ 19 ] [ 20 ] [ 21 ] [ 22 ] [ 23 ] Brenner was born in the town of Germiston in the then Transvaal (today in Gauteng ), South Africa, on 13 January 1927. [ 2 ] His parents, Leah [ 24 ] (née Blecher) and Morris Brenner, were Jewish immigrants. His father, a cobbler, came to South Africa from Lithuania in 1910, and his mother from Riga , Latvia, in 1922. He had one sister, Phyllis and also one brother, Isaac. [ 25 ] [ 26 ] He was educated at Germiston High School [ 2 ] and the University of the Witwatersrand . Having joined the university at the age of 15, it was noted during his second year that he would be too young to qualify for the practice of medicine at the conclusion of his six-year medical course, and he was therefore allowed to complete a Bachelor of Science degree in Anatomy and Physiology. During this time he was taught physical chemistry by Joel Mandelstam , microscopy by Alfred Oettle and neurology by Harold Daitz . He also received an introduction to anthropology and paleontology from Raymond Dart and Robert Broom . The histologist Joseph Gillman and director of research in the Anatomy Department persuaded Brenner to continue towards an honours degree and beyond towards an MSc. Brenner accepted though this would mean he would not graduate from medical school and his bursary would Fields: Biology
About the Lasker Award
The Lasker Awards have been awarded annually since 1946 to living persons who have made major contributions to medical science or who have performed public service on behalf of medicine. They are administered by the Lasker Foundation, founded by advertising pioneer Albert Lasker and his wife Mary Woodard Lasker (a medical research activist). The awards are sometimes referred to as "America's Nobels."
Quick Facts
- Award: Lasker Award - Basic Medical Research
- Added: 2026-02-07
- Source: Wikipedia
- Established: 1946
- Presented by: Lasker Foundation