Jewish American Historical Figures
Learn about the extraordinary lives and contributions of vital figures in medical history.
Rita Levi-Montalcini, M.D.
April 22, 1909-December 30, 2012Rita Levi-Montalcini was an Italian-Jewish neurobiologist who discovered the nerve growth factor and won the Nobel Prize in 1986 for Physiology or Medicine alongside collaborator Stanley Cohen.
Eric Kandel, M.D.
November 7, 1929-PresentNobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel’s advanced research uncovered how memory is formed down to the cellular level, which helped lay the informational foundation for modern neuroscience.
Gisella Perl, M.D.
December 10, 1907-November 24, 1988Gisella Perl was a Hungarian Jewish gynecologist and Holocaust survivor who risked her life to save women in Auschwitz and later rebuilt her medical career in the United States.
Karl Landsteiner, M.D.
June 14, 1868-June 26, 1943Karl Landsteiner was an Austrian Jewish physician who discovered blood groups, enabling safe blood transfusions and transforming modern medicine.
Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, Ph.D.
July 19, 1921-May 30, 2011Rosalyn Sussman Yalow was a Jewish-American physicist who co-developed radioimmunoassay, a technique that transformed medical diagnostics and was awarded with the Nobel Prize in 1977.
Baruj Benacerraf, M.D.
October 29, 1920-August 2, 2011Baruj Benacerraf was a Venezuelan Jewish immunologist and Nobel Prize-winner whose work on immune response genes helped transform modern medicine.
Gertrude Elion, M.S.
January 23, 1918-February 21, 1999Gertrude Elion was a Jewish-American scientist and Nobel Prize-winner whose drug discoveries have significantly helped treat cancer, infections and organ rejection.
Ashley Oliver, M.D.
Dr. Ashley Oliver is a cardiac anesthesiologist at UCLA Health whose clinical focus on high-acuity surgical care is shaped by a multidisciplinary background and her identity as a Black Jewish American physician.