Gerald Edelman
American biologist (1929-2014) · United States · On the map · Scientists · Died at 84
Gerald Maurice Edelman was an American biologist who shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work with Rodney Robert Porter on the immune system. Edelman's Nobel Prize-winning research concerned discovery of the structure of antibody molecules.
Gerald Edelman is read about 62 times a day, in 54 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 6 November 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 104 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?A life in dates
Media & music
Photos 3
Diagram illustrating the disulfide bonds (red) that link the light (green) and heavy (blue) protein subunits of Immunoglobulin G (IgG) molecules. This diagram also illustrates the relative positions of the variable (V) and constant (C) domains of an IgG molecule. The heavy and light chain variable regions come together to form antigen binding sites at the end of the two symmetrical arms of the antibody.
Edelman in 2010Awards
About this person
In interviews, he has said that the way the components of the immune system evolve over the life of the individual is analogous to the way the components of the brain evolve in a lifetime. There is a continuity in this way between his work on the immune system, for which he won the Nobel Prize, and his later work in neuroscience and in philosophy of mind.
