John Howard Northrop, a Nobel laureate in chemistry, is best known for his work on the purification and crystallization of enzymes, which regulate important body functions like digestion and respiration. Northrop's studies on the chemical composition of enzymes enabled him to confirm the hypothesis that enzymes are proteins--a discovery that spurred much additional research on these critical catalysts of biochemical reactions. For this discovery, Northrop was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1946. In addition to these studies, he also contributed to the development of techniques for isolating--and thus identifying--a variety of substances, including bacterial viruses and valuable antitoxins.

Northrop was born in Yonkers, New York, on July 5, 1891, to John Isaiah and Alice Belle (Rich) Northrop. The Northrops hailed from a long list of notable ancestors; well-known relations include the Reverend Jonathan Edwards, president of Princeton University in 1758. Prior to his son's birth, Isaiah Northrop was killed in...