Stockton- As a young teenager growing up in New York, Gertrude Elion witnessed the effects of cancer as it took the life of her grandfather. From this point onward, Elion knew that the only way to help others who struggled just like her loving grandfather was to help fight the disease, and she would devote her life to being part of the change. As a Jewish-American woman during the 1900s, finding jobs in the chemistry field was no easy task. However, it was during World War II that the shortage of chemists arose due to war, and Elion was able to start the work of better understanding cancer like she had dreamed of doing since a young girl.
During the 1950s, Gertrude Elion revolutionized the medical field as a whole by producing new pharmaceuticals from her and her partner George Hitching’s knowledge of biochemistry and diseases. As a team, they were the first to be able to create drugs from something other than natural substances. The first drug produced helped control the effects of cancer leukemia and was extremely beneficial in children affected by the disease. Often referred to by scientists now as the “rational drug design,” Elion and Hitchings trial and error drug development led to a number of effective drugs that would help save lives for years to come.
In 1988 the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for discovering important principles of drug treatment was awarded to Elion and her team of chemists for their incredible work in the field of medicine. She was also one of the few women recipients of the American Chemical Society’s prestigious Garvan Medal, awarded in 1968. Gertrude Elion’s dedication to helping cure cancer laid foundational work for future scientists to hopefully one day find a cure or help better the field of medicine just like Elion was able to do.
