| Authorised form of name | Fischer; Edmond Henri (1920-2021); biochemist |
| Dates | 1920-2021 |
| Nationality | French |
| Place of birth | Shanghai International Settlement, Shanghai, China, Asia |
| Date of birth | 06 April 1920 |
| Place of death | Seattle, Washington, United States of America |
| Date of death | 27 August 2021 |
| Occupation | Biochemist |
| Research field | Organic chemistry |
| Molecular Biology |
| Physiology |
| Biochemistry |
| Activity | Education: La Châtaigneraie, Swiss boarding school, Lake Geneva; Collège de Calvin, all boys college, Geneva 1935; Geneva Conservatory of Music; University of Geneva PhD 1947
Career:
Joined the faculty of the University of Washington, Seattle, as Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry (1953); became a full professor of Biochemistry (1961); and professor emeritus (1990).
Medals and prizes:
Nobel Prize (Physiology or Medicine) 1992
Werner Prize from the Swiss Chemical Society
Prix Jaubert from the University of Geneva
Lederle Medical Faculty Award
Doctorates Honoris Causa from the University of Montpellier, France and the University of Basel, Switzerland
Memberships:
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
US National Academy of Sciences
Honorary President of the World Cultural Council |
| Membership category | Foreign Member |
| Date of election | 20/05/2010 |
| Age at election | 90 |
| Relationships | Parents: Renée Tapernoux and Oscar Fischer, attourney.
Siblings: Raoul and George Fischer.
Spouse: 1) (m. 1948-1961) Nelly Gagnaux (d. 1961); 2) (m. 1963-2006) Beverly Bullock, from Eureka, California (d. 2016).
Children: François and Henri from his first marriage, and Paula Dandliker, his stepdaughter from his second marriage.
Grandchildren: Élyse, Léandre, Ian, and Edmond. |
| PublishedWorks | RCN R80770 |
| OtherInfo | His seminal research revealed the role and importance of reversible phosphorylation-the attachment and detachment of phosphate groups to cell proteins- in the regulation of many cellular processes and immune responses.
With his colleague Edwin Krebs, Edmond was the first to purify and detail an enzyme, protein kinase, involved in the phosphorylation process. In acknowledgment of their work in this field, the pair were joint recipients of the 1992 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
At the time of his death, he was the oldest living Nobel Prize laureate.
His maternal grandfather established a French newspaper and school in Shanghai. |
| Source | The Royal Society Fellows Directory, Professor Edmond Fischer ForMemRS, [URL: https://royalsociety.org/people/edmond-fischer-11437/; last accessed: 03/09/2025]
The Nobel Prize, Edmond H. Fischer, Biographical, [URL: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1992/fischer/biographical/; last accessed: 03/09/2025]
UW Medicine, News Room, Leila Gray, In Memoriam: Nobel Laureate Edmond Fischer, 31 August 2021, [URL: https://newsroom.uw.edu/news-releases/memoriam-nobel-laureate-edmond-fischer; last accessed: 03/09/2025]
University of Washington, Edmond Fischer, Department of Biochemistry, [URL: https://sites.uw.edu/biochemistry/faculty/edmond-fischer/; last accessed: 03/09/2025] |
| Code | NA9704 |