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PAPERS OF NOBEL LAUREATE, LINUS PAULING, ADDED TO "PROFILES IN SCIENCE" WEB SITE
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Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2003 10:12:37 -0500
From: "NIH OLIB (NIH/OD)"
Subject: PAPERS OF NOBEL LAUREATE, LINUS PAULING,ADDED
TO "PROFILES IN SC IENCE" WEB SITE
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH
NIH News Release
National Library of Medicine
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, February 7, 2003
Contact:
Robert MehnertKathy Cravedi
(301) 496-6308
publicinfo@nlm.nih.gov
PAPERS OF NOBEL LAUREATE, LINUS PAULING, ADDED TO
"PROFILESIN SCIENCE" WEB SITE
BETHESDA, MARYLAND -- He was a high school drop-out,
amaverick who jumped disciplinary fences, and an
activist who was attacked for his political beliefs.
Yet he won two Nobel prizes and published more than
500 papers and 11books. His name was Linus Carl
Pauling (1901-1994) and he is probably one of the few
scientists to be a household name.
Linus Pauling is the eighth scientist to be added to
theNational Library of Medicine's (NLM) "Profiles in
Science" Web site (http://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/). He
remains the only person in history to win two unshared
Nobel Prizes. "Linus Pauling revolutionized the study
of chemistry, and made crucial contributions to
medical research," said Dr.Alexa McCray, who heads up
the "Profiles" project.
To celebrate the inclusion of Pauling's papers on the
Profiles Web site, the Friends of the National Library
of Medicine and the American Chemical Society will
host a reception in Room 328 of the Russell Senate
Office Buildingon Tuesday, February 11, from 5:30 to
7:30 p.m. Dr. Linus Pauling, Jr., the oldest son of
Linus Pauling, will greet the guests.
The "Profiles" online exhibit features correspondence,
unpublished manuscripts, lecture notes, photographs,
reprints, and transcripts from speeches documenting
the life and career of Dr. Pauling. Visitors to the
Pauling site can view, for example, his senior class
oration at Oregon State Agricultural College,
photographs of Pauling at work in his laboratory, and
the petition that he and other scientists circulated
that called for an end to nuclear testing. The NLM is
collaborating with Oregon State University's Valley
Library to digitize and make available over the Web
this selection of the Pauling Papers for use by
educators, researchers, students, and the public. The
University is the repository for the Linus Pauling
papers.
Pauling was a descendent of a Portland, Oregon pioneer
family. He grew up in an impoverished household after
the death of his father when Pauling was 9. His
interest in science began at age 14, following a visit
to a friend with a toy chemistry set.
Pauling dropped out of high school at 16 and enrolled
atOregon Agricultural College (now Oregon State
University), where he graduated as a chemical engineer
in 1922. He set his sights on answering one of the
most important questions of chemistry: how did atoms
bond together to formmolecules? Pauling chose a
fledgling Pasadena school, the California Institute of
Technology, or Caltech, to help get those answers, and
he earned his PhD there in 1925.
After 15 months in Europe on a Guggenheim Fellowship
andstudying with European physicists, Pauling returned
to Caltech as a young faculty member in 1927. He began
to rebuild chemistry on a new foundation of quantum
mechanics. This work was capped in 1939 with the
publication of "The Nature of the Chemical Bond", one
of the most-cited textsin the history of science.
>From the late 1920s to the 1930s, Pauling devised new
ways of discovering the molecular structures of
complex substances. His work focused on the
antigen-antibody reaction and the structure of
proteins and, in 1949, Pauling's team discovered the
molecular basis of sickle-cell anemia. In the early
1950s, Pauling used his model-building approach to
solve the large-scale structures of many proteins,
such as hemoglobin, an enormous advance in molecular
biology. He also proposed a model for the structure of
DNA. In 1954, Pauling's many achievements were crowned
with the awarding of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
In the post-World War II period, and spurred by the
pacifist activism of his wife Ava Helen, Pauling
joined other scientists in expressing concerns about
nuclear bomb testing. The U.S. government responded by
putting him under FBI surveillance, canceling his
research grants, and refusing him a passport. Despite
these pressures, Pauling continued to focus his
attention on peace work. He and hiswife gained
worldwide fame by gathering the signatures of 11,000
scientists on a petition asking for an end to nuclear
weapons testing, which they then presented to the
United Nations.
On the day that the first nuclear test ban treaty went
into effect, October 10, 1963, Pauling received the
news that he was to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Instead of warm public support, the scientist
encountered widespread criticism. "Life Magazine", for
example, called the prize "a weird insult from
Norway," and the head of Caltech offered a weak
congratulations. One week later, Pauling quit Caltech,
leaving the school that had been his academic home for
more than 40 years.
Between 1973 and 1994, Pauling's research focused on
afield he termed "orthomolecular medicine," the
concept that optimal health could result from ensuring
the rightmolecules were present in the right amount in
the body. He viewed Vitamin C as one of the most
important of these molecules, oversaw a number of
investigations into its effects on diseases, and
encouraged the ingestion of daily amounts many times
greater than the accepted minimum daily requirement.
He conducted research in this field until his death
from cancer in 1994, at age 93.
"Profiles in Science" was launched by NLM in September
1998. The Library is a part of the National Institutes
of Health, an agency of the Department of Health and
Human Services, in Bethesda, Maryland. "Profiles" is a
continuing project and the Library plans to announce
each new scientist added to the site.
NOTE TO EDITORS: Photographs of Linus Pauling are
available from NLM. E-mail requests to
publicinfo@nlm.nih.gov.
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John Jacobus, MS
Certified Health Physicist
e-mail: crispy_bird@yahoo.com
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