1906-1979

German Biochemist

In 1945 Ernst Boris Chain shared the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for 1945 with Alexander Fleming and Howard Walter Florey "for the discovery of penicillin and its curative effect in various infectious diseases." Fleming had discovered the antibacterial action of the penicillium mold in 1928, but Chain and Florey recognized its therapeutic powers in 1940 and went on to isolate and purify penicillin. Although Fleming noted that his crude penicillin preparation was nontoxic when injected into mice, he did not carry out experiments to determine whether it would actually cure mice that had been infected with a virulent bacterium, such as streptococcus.

Chain, the son of Michael Chain, a chemist and industrialist, was born in Berlin. Chain became interested in chemistry while he was a student at the Luisengymnasium in Berlin. Both his teachers and his visits to his father's workplace stimulated his...