Call Number:

060.002

Repository:

Science History Institute Archives

Extent:

1 linear feet (1 box; ca. 41 print photographs)

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

Collection or item title, Othmer Library of Chemical History, Science History Institute..

Date:

1985-2001 (inclusive)

Creator:

Mojsov, Svetlana, Dr., Unson-O'Brien, Cecille, Dr., and Fields, Greg, Dr.

Form:

Photographs and Photograph collections

Abstract:

Photographs of Dr. Robert Bruce Merrifield and his students and colleagues from 1985 to 2001.

Robert Bruce Merrifield was born on July 15, 1921. He attended the University of California at Los Angeles for both his bachelor's degree and doctorate, where he studied under professor of biochemistry M.S. Dunn. Upon his graduation in 1949, he married Elizabeth (Libby) Furlong, a biologist, and moved to New York City to work as a research assistant at the Rockefeller Institute (later Rockefeller University). Merrifield remained there for over forty years, becoming a professor and retiring with the title "John D. Rockefeller Jr. Professor" in 1992. His wife Libby also joined the Merrifield laboratory at Rockefeller University after raising their six children. R. Bruce Merrifield worked on dinucleotide and peptide growth factors and his 1963 paper on what he called solid phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) became one of the most often-cited papers in scientific history. This work led to a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1984. Merrifield received several awards and honorary degrees, and was elected a member of the U.S National Academy of Sciences. He died in Cresskill, New Jersey on May 14, 2006.

For a more detailed inventory, please view this record in our library catalog: https://othmerlib.sciencehistory.org/record=b1075595~S6

This collection contains color and black and white photographs, one negative strip, and one photographic slide of Dr. Robert Bruce Merrifield and his students and colleagues from 1985 to 2001. The bulk of the photographs document social gatherings of Merrifield and his students both in and outside the laboratory. Individuals pictured include Merrifield and his wife Elizabeth (Libby), Cecille Unson, David Andreu and family, Viren Sarin and family, and Pedro Calvijo. Identifications were made by the processing archivist. Notably, there is one photograph of Merrifield receiving an honorary degree at the University of Barcelona in 1986. This collection also contains formal portraits of Garland R. Marshall, Jr., who worked under Merrifield, and biochemist Charles Deber.