Gertrude Belle Elion's innovative approach to drug discovery advanced the understanding of cellular metabolism and led to the development of medications for leukemia, gout, herpes, malaria, and the rejection of transplanted organs. Azidothymidine (AZT), the first drug approved for the treatment of AIDS, came out of her laboratory shortly after her retirement in 1983. One of the few women who held a top post at a major pharmaceutical company, Elion worked at Wellcome Research Laboratories for nearly five decades. Her work, with colleague George H. Hitchings, was recognized with the Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine in 1988. Her Nobel Prize was notable for several reasons: few winners have been women, few have lacked the Ph.D., and few have been industrial researchers.

Elion was born on January 23, 1918, in New York City, the first of two children, to Robert Elion and Bertha Cohen. Her father, a dentist, immigrated to the...