Baruj Benacerraf (1920-2011)

Awarded the Prize “for his discoveries concerning genetically determined structures on the cell surface that regulate immunological reactions.”

American pathologist immunologist. Benacerraf was born on October 29, 1920 in Caracas, Venezuela. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science Degree at Columbia University in 1942. He was naturalized American citizen in 1943 took his M.D. at Medical College of Virginia in 1945. Then he was offered internship at Queens General Hospital in New York City. After working at the Columbia University College of Physicians Surgeons, he moved to the French National Center for Scientific Research at the Broussais Hospital in Paris. In 1956 he joined the faculty of New York University, School of Medicine, becoming a professor of pathology in 1960. Benacerraf died on August 2, 2011 in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, USA.