Gertrude Perlmann

Gertrude Erika Perlmann (April 20, 1912 – September 9, 1974) was an Austro-Hungarian Empire-born U.S. biochemist and structural biologist. She is known for her work in protein chemistry, particularly her discoveries on the biology of phosphoproteins and the structure and action of pepsin and pepsinogen.

Early life Perlmann was born on April 20, 1912, in Liberec (Reichenberg), Austro-Hungarian Empire to a Jewish family.

Education She earned a doctorate in chemistry and physics at the German University of Prague in 1936. She fled Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia for Denmark in 1936. She continued her postdoctoral training in Copenhagen at the Biological Institute of the Carlsberg Laboratory with Dr. Fritz Lipmann and Prof. K. Linderstrom-Lang until 1939.

Awards In the 1960s she was awarded the Silver Medal of the Chemical Society and the Legion of Honor by the French. She was one of the first female corresponding members of the Académie des Sciences. She won the Garvan–Olin Medal in 1965 from the American Chemical Society for "distinguished service to chemistry," for her research on the structure of pepsin, an enzyme that hastens food digestion. She was also awarded the French Order of Merit in 1974. , and who is also the Secretary General of the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine.

Death She died of cancer at New York Hospital on September 9, 1974.

Selected publications