Jewish Scientists

This is a list of Jewish American scientists.

Biologists and Physicians

* Richard Axel, olfactory system, Nobel Prize (2004)

* Julius Axelrod, neurotransmitters, Nobel Prize (1970)

* David Baltimore, reverse transcriptase, Nobel Prize (1975)

* Baruj Benacerraf, immunologist, Nobel Prize (1980)

* Konrad Bloch, cholesterol, Nobel Prize (1959)

* Samuel Blum, excimer laser surgery

* Baruch Blumberg, hepatitis B vaccine, Nobel Prize (1976)

* Michael S. Brown, molecular geneticist, Nobel Prize (1985)

* Stanley Cohen, neurologist, Nobel Prize (1986)

* Stanley N. Cohen, genetic engineering

* Gerty Cori, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1947)

* Jared Diamond, evolutionary biologist & biogeographer

* Carl Djerassi, contraceptive pill

* Gerald Edelman, biologist, Nobel Prize (1972)

* Gertrude Elion, drug development, Nobel Prize (1988)

* Joseph Erlanger, physiologist, Nobel Prize (1945)

* Edmond H. Fischer, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1992) (half Jewish)

* Judah Folkman, cancer angiogenesis

* Casimir Funk, vitamins

* Robert F. Furchgott, pharmacologist, Nobel Prize (1998)

* Herbert Gasser, physiologist, Nobel Prize (1945) (half Jewish)

* Alfred G. Gilman, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1994)

* Avram Goldstein, opiate receptors

* Joseph L. Goldstein, molecular geneticist, Nobel Prize (1985)

* Michael Gottlieb, Joel Weisman, early identifiers of AIDS

* Paul Greengard, neuroscientist, Nobel Prize (1990)

* Stephen Jay Gould, evolutionary biologist & writer

* Michael Heidelberger, immunochemist

* H. Robert Horvitz, biologist, Nobel Prize (2002)

* Jerome Horwitz, AZT

* Eric R. Kandel, neuroscientist, Nobel Prize (2000)

* Charles Kelman, cataract surgery

* Carl Koller, local anesthesia

* Arthur Kornberg, DNA replication, Nobel Prize (1959)

* Eric Lander, Human Genome Project

* Joshua & Esther Lederberg, molecular biologists, Nobel Prize (1958)

* Rita Levi-Montalcini, neurologist, Nobel Prize (1986)

* Jay Levy, AIDS researcher

* Richard Lewontin, evolutionary biologist

* Fritz Lipmann, coenzyme A, Nobel Prize (1953)

* Otto Loewi, acetylcholine, Nobel Prize (1936)

* Salvador Luria, bacterial evolution, Nobel Prize (1969)

* Lynn Margulis, Gaia theory

* Matthew Messelson, DNA replication

* Otto Meyerhof, glycolysis, Nobel Prize (1922)

* Stanley Miller, Miller-Urey experiment

* Irving Millman, viral hepatitis vaccine

* Hermann Muller, geneticist, Nobel Prize (1946) (half Jewish)

* Daniel Nathans, microbiologist, Nobel Prize (1978)

* Marshall Nirenberg, genetic code, Nobel Prize (1968)

* Gregory Pincus, contraceptive pill

* Stanley Prusiner, neurologist, Nobel Prize (1997)

* Martin Rodbell, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1994)

* Albert Sabin, oral polio vaccine

* Jonas Salk, polio vaccine

* Andrew V. Schally, endocrinologist, Nobel Prize (1977)

* Albert Schatz, streptomycin

* Béla Schick, diphtheria test

* Rudolf Schoenheimer, radioactive tracers

* Alexander Shulgin, pharmacologist, populariser of ecstasy

* Solomon H. Snyder, opiate receptors

* Adolphus Solomons, co-founder of the American Red Cross

* Leo Sternbach, valium

* Howard Temin, reverse transcriptase, Nobel Prize (1975)

* Max Tishler, synthetic vitamins

* Harold Varmus, virologist, Nobel Prize (1989)

* George Wald, retina pigmentation, Nobel Prize (1967)

* Selman Waksman, streptomycin, Nobel Prize (1952)

* Charles Weissmann, interferon cloning

* Rosalyn Yalow, medical physicist, Nobel Prize (1977)

* Charles Yanofsky, geneticist

Chemists

* Christian B. Anfinsen, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1972) (converted)

* Sidney Altman, chemist, Nobel Prize (1989)

* Paul Berg, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1980)

* R. Stephen Berry, physical chemist

* Herbert C. Brown, chemist, Nobel Prize (1979)

* Melvin Calvin, calvin cycle, Nobel Prize (1961)

* Erwin Chargaff, DNA pioneer

* Morris Cohen, metallurgist

* Camille & Henry Dreyfus, cellulose acetate, founders of Celanese

* Kasimir Fajans, isotopes, identified protactinium

* Walter Gilbert, DNA sequencing, Nobel Prize (1980)

* Henry Gilman, organometallic chemist

* Victor Moritz Goldschmidt, geochemist

* Moses Gomberg, free radicals

* Norman Hackerman, chemist

* Herbert A. Hauptman, chemist, Nobel Prize (1985)

* Alan J Heeger, chemist, Nobel Prize (2000)

* Roald Hoffmann, chemist & writer, Nobel Prize (1981)

* Martin Kamen, Carbon 14

* Jerome Karle, chemist, Nobel Prize (1985)

* Martin Karplus, theoretical chemist

* Walter Kohn, physicist, Nobel Prize (1998)

* Izaak Kolthoff, analytical chemist

* Phoebus Levene, nucleic acid pioneer

* Rudolph A. Marcus, chemist, Nobel Prize (1992)

* Jacob A. Marinsky, discovered promethium

* Herman Mark, polymers (half Jewish)

* George Olah, chemist, Nobel Prize (1994)

* Irwin Rose, biologist, Nobel Prize (2004)

* William Stein, biochemist, Nobel Prize (1972)

Computer Scientists

* Hal Abelson, artificial intelligence

* Norman Abramson, ALOHAnet

* Len Adleman, RSA cryptography, DNA computing, Turing Award (2002)

* Paul Baran, packet switching

* Yehoshua Bar-Hillel, machine translation

* Dan Bernstein, cryptologist (unconfirmed)

* Manuel Blum, computational complexity, Turing Award (1995)

* Gregory Chaitin, algorithmic information theory

* Peter Elias, information theory

* Robert Fano, information theory

* Edward Feigenbaum, artificial intelligence, Turing Award (1994)

* William F. Friedman, cryptologist

* Eugene Garfield, library & information scientist

* David Gelernter, parallel computation, Unabomber victim

* Adele Goldberg, Smalltalk design team

* Herman & Adele Goldstine, developers of ENIAC

* Shafi Goldwasser, cryptographer

* Martin Hellman, public key cryptography

* Douglas Hofstadter, academic & author (half Jewish)

* Bob Kahn, TCP/IP

* Richard Karp, computational complexity, Turing Award (1985)

* John Kemeny, BASIC

* Leonard Kleinrock, packet switching

* Joseph Kruskal, Kruskal's algorithm

* Solomon Kullback, cryptographer

* Raymond Kurzweil, OCR, speech recognition

* Leslie Lamport, LaTeX

* Jaron Lanier, virtual reality

* Douglas Lenat, artificial intelligence

* Leonid Levin, computational complexity

* John McCarthy, LISP, Turing Award (1971) (Jewish mother)

* Marvin Minsky, artificial intelligence, neural nets, Turing Award (1969)

* John von Neumann, computer scientist, mathematician & economist

* David Parnas, software engineering

* Seymour Papert, LOGO

* Judea Pearl, baysean networks

* Ken Perlin, fractal noise

* Alan J. Perlis, compilers, Turing Award (1966)

* Lawrence Rabiner, digital signal processing

* Frank Rosenblatt, perceptrons

* Azriel Rosenfeld, image analysis

* Jean E. Sammet, language design

* Bruce Schneier, cryptographer

* Herbert Simon, cognitive & computer scientist, Turing Award (1975)

* Abraham Sinkov, cryptanalyst

* Daniel Sleator, splay trees (Jewish mother)

* Gustave Solomon, error correction

* Ray Solomonoff, algorithmic information theory

* Richard Stallman, GNU, FSF

* Gerald Jay Sussman, Scheme

* Jeffrey D. Ullman, compilers

* Leslie Valiant, parallel computing

* Andrew Viterbi, Viterbi algorithm

* Peter J. Weinberger, awk

* Joseph Weizenbaum, ELIZA, artifical intelligence critic

* Avi Wigderson, randomized algorithms

* Norbert Wiener, cybernetics

* Terry Winograd, SHRDLU

* Jacob Wolfowitz, information theory

* Lotfi Zadeh, fuzzy logic (half Jewish)

Inventors

* Robert Adler, remote control

* Zora Arkus-Duntov, father of the Corvette

* Ralph Baer, games console

* Emile Berliner, gramophone

* Richard Frenkiel & Joel Engel, cellular technology

* Joseph Friedman, flexistraw

* Charles Ginsburg, video recorder

* Joseph Gerber, inventor

* Leopold Godowsky, Jr. & Leopold Mannes, Kodachrome

* Sylvan Goldman, shopping cart

* Peter Goldmark, LP record, color television

* Bernard Gordon, inventor

* Gordon Gould, laser

* Al Gross, pager, walkie-talkie (unconfirmed)

* Dean Kamen, inventor (unconfirmed)

* Arthur Korn, pre-fax

* Hedy Lamarr, spread spectrum communication

* Robert Langer, biotechnology

* Edwin H. Land, polaroid

* Julius Lilienfeld, pre-transistor

* Stanford Ovshinsky, inventor

* Ron Popeil, inventor

* Jacob Rabinow, inventor

* Harold Rosen, geosynchronous satellite

* Raymond Scott, sequencer, portable synthesizer

Mathematicians

* Kenneth Appel, four-color problem

* Richard Bellman, dynamic programming (half Jewish)

* Salomon Bochner, harmonic analysis

* Raoul Bott, geometry (half Jewish)

* Richard Brauer, modular representation theory

* Eugenio Calabi, differential geometry

* Paul Cohen, set theorist, Fields Medal (1966)

* Richard Courant, algebraic topology

* George Dantzig, simplex algorithm

* Martin Davis, mathematician

* Persi Diaconis, statistician

* Jesse Douglas, mathematician, Fields Medal (1936)

* Samuel Eilenberg, category theorist

* Noam Elkies, mathematician

* Charles Fefferman, mathematician, Fields Medal (1978)

* Mitchell Feigenbaum, chaos theorist

* William Feller, probability theory

* Michael Freedman, mathematician, Fields Medal (1986) (half Jewish)

* Solomon Golomb, polyominoes

* Paul Halmos, mathematician

* Mark Kac, mathematician

* Edward Kasner, mathematician

* Martin Kruskal, mathematician

* Peter Lax, mathematician, Abel Prize (2005)

* Solomon Lefschetz, algebraic topology

* Norman Levinson, mathematician

* Barry Mazur, mathematician

* Louis Mordell, number theorist

* George Pólya, mathematician

* Emil Post, logician

* Herbert Robbins, statistician

* Abraham Robinson, nonstandard analysis

* Isadore Singer, mathematician, Abel Prize (2004)

* Richard P. Stanley, mathematician

* Elias Stein, mathematician

* Alfred Tarski, logician

* Stanislaw Ulam, mathematician

* André Weil, mathematician

* Edward Witten, M-theory, Fields Medal (1990)

* Oscar Zariski, algebraic geometry

Physicists

* Ralph Alpher, background radiation

* John Bahcall, astrophysicist

* Hans Bethe, nuclear physicist, Nobel Prize (1967) (Jewish mother)

* Felix Bloch, nuclear physicist, Nobel Prize (1952)

* David Bohm, quantum physicist, philosopher of science

* Leon Cooper, BCS theory, Nobel Prize (1972)

* Martin Deutsch, positronium

* Albert Einstein, theoretical physicist, Nobel Prize (1921)

* Richard Feynman, quantum physicist, Nobel Prize (1965)

* David Finkelstein, physicist

* James Franck, physicist, Nobel Prize (1925)

* Edward Fredkin, digital physicist

* Herbert Friedman, solar X-rays

* Jerome Friedman, physicist, Nobel Prize (1990)

* Margaret Geller, astronomer

* Murray Gell-Mann, quarks, Nobel Prize (1969)

* Sheldon Glashow, physicist, Nobel Prize (1979)

* Donald A. Glaser, bubble chamber, Nobel Prize (1960)

* Thomas Gold, cosmologist (Jewish father)

* Daniel S. Goldin, NASA administrator

* Samuel Goudsmit, electron spin

* David Gross, string theorist, Nobel Prize (2004)

* Alan Guth, cosmic inflation

* Robert Hofstadter, physicist, Nobel Prize (1961)

* Theodore von Kármán, aeronautical engineer

* Daniel Kleppner, atomic research

* Leon M. Lederman, physicist, Nobel Prize (1988)

* David Morris Lee, superfluidity, Nobel Prize (1996)

* Albert Libchaber, chaos theorist

* Fritz London, quantum chemistry

* Theodore Maiman, first operable laser

* Ben Roy Mottelson, physicist, Nobel Prize (1975)

* Albert Michelson, speed of light, Nobel Prize (1907)

* Robert Oppenheimer, nuclear physicist

* Douglas D. Osheroff, superfluidity, Nobel Prize (1996)

* Abraham Pais, historian of science

* Wolfgang Pauli, nuclear physicist, Nobel Prize (1945) (Jewish father, half-Jewish mother)

* Arno Allan Penzias, background radiation, Nobel Prize (1978)

* Martin Lewis Perl, physicist, Nobel Prize (1995)

* H. David Politzer, physicist, Nobel Prize (2004)

* Isidor Isaac Rabi, physicist, Nobel Prize (1944)