Elizabeth Roboz Einstein facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Elizabeth Roboz Einstein
Born	Elizabeth Roboz (1904-04-11)April 11, 1904 Szászváros, Kingdom of Hungary (today Orăștie, Romania])
Died	January 9, 1995(1995-01-09) (aged 90) Berkeley, California, U.S.
Alma mater	University of Vienna University of Budapest
Known for	Isolation and characterization of myelin basic protein
Spouse(s)	Hans Albert Einstein
Scientific career
Fields	neurochemistry, biochemistry, neurology, developmental neurobiology
Institutions	University of California, Berkeley University of California, San Francisco Georgetown University California Institute of Technology Stanford University University of Wyoming

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein (born April 11, 1904, died January 9, 1995) was a brilliant scientist. She was a biochemist and neuroscientist. She is famous for finding and studying a special protein called myelin basic protein (MBP). This protein is important for understanding diseases like multiple sclerosis (MS). She also helped create the field of neurochemistry, which is the study of chemicals in the brain.

Early Life and School

Elizabeth Roboz was born in 1904 in a place called Szászváros. This area was part of Hungary then, but it's now in Romania. Her father, who was a teacher and a religious leader, passed away in 1914. After that, her mother moved Elizabeth and her five brothers and sisters to another city in Hungary.

Elizabeth was a very good student. She got excellent grades on all her final high school exams. However, at that time, there were rules in Hungary that limited how many Jewish students could go to the University of Budapest. To make sure she could continue her studies, she decided to go to the University of Vienna instead.

In 1928, she earned her Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Vienna. She graduated with the highest honors! When she returned to Hungary, the University of Budapest made her take her exams again before they would accept her degree.

In 1940, Elizabeth moved from Hungary to the United States. She faced many challenges during this time. Her family stayed in Hungary and were affected by World War II. After the war, her other brothers and sisters joined her in the United States. One of her sisters, Edith, even lived with her in California.

Her Amazing Career

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein started her science journey by studying plants. When she was a university student, she worked in a lab in Vienna, learning about plant chemicals. Later, she set up a lab for a Hungarian company to study how plants get their food. She even represented the company at big science meetings! After moving to the U.S., she set up another plant lab for a potato company.

Working at Universities

After working in companies, Elizabeth moved to universities, where she spent most of her career.

• In 1942, she joined the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). She worked as a research assistant, studying a plant called Aloe vera. She was promoted, but Caltech didn't hire women as full professors back then.
• So, in 1945, she became an associate professor of chemistry at the University of Wyoming. She also worked as a research chemist there.
• In 1948, she moved to Stanford University as a research associate. She also worked at Stanford's Food Research Laboratory.
• In 1952, she went to Georgetown University as an associate professor of biochemistry. She taught medical students and lectured at a hospital. It was at Georgetown that she became very interested in multiple sclerosis (MS). She started studying neurochemistry to teach her students.
• She returned to Stanford University in 1958. This time, she was an associate professor of neurology. She was chosen to lead Stanford's new Koshland Laboratory of Neurochemistry.
• In 1959, she moved to the University of California, San Francisco to be closer to her home. Later, she moved to the University of California's Berkeley Campus.

Much of her work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a big U.S. government agency that funds health research. She was also a member of important science groups like the American Chemical Society. In 1957, she helped start a special neurochemistry section within the American Academy of Neurology.

Her Important Research

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein made a huge discovery! She found out that a protein called myelin basic protein (MBP) was the cause of an immune reaction in animals. This reaction was similar to what happens in multiple sclerosis (MS). Scientists knew that injecting animals with nerve tissue could cause a disease like MS, but they didn't know what specific part of the tissue was responsible.

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein and another scientist, Karian Kies, were able to clean and separate MBP. They showed that this protein alone could cause the disease in animals. This discovery was a big step forward! It allowed scientists to find out which parts of the protein caused the immune reaction. This led to better ways to study MS and look for new treatments.

In 1968, she received a research grant to study what made this protein cause disease. She also created ways to measure important substances in the fluid around the brain and spinal cord. She studied how changes in these substances could lead to illness. She even did research in Bangkok, Thailand, studying a disease related to rabies vaccine.

Besides studying diseases, she also researched how the nervous system develops normally. At the University of California, San Francisco, she studied proteins in brain tissue. She looked at how these proteins change as the brain develops, especially during the formation of myelin. Myelin is like insulation around nerve fibers.

At the University of California, Berkeley, she worked with a colleague to study how the brain and hormones interact. They looked at how thyroid hormones affect myelin development. They found that these hormones influence when myelin starts to form and how much of it is made. This research helped lead to hormone replacement therapy for babies born with certain thyroid problems.

Her Personal Life

In June 1959, Elizabeth Roboz married Hans Albert Einstein. Hans was the first son of the famous physicist Albert Einstein. He was a professor of hydraulic engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. Elizabeth and Hans did not have children together. Hans had four children from his first marriage, but only two lived to adulthood. Hans passed away in 1973. Elizabeth later wrote a book about his life and their life together.

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein's discovery about myelin basic protein caught the attention of Jonas Salk. He was the scientist who developed the polio vaccine. He visited Elizabeth in 1965 to learn more about her work. They became friends and worked together, exchanging letters for many years. Elizabeth also wrote letters to another famous scientist, Esther Lederberg, who was a microbiologist.

Elizabeth enjoyed traveling, cooking, listening to music, and being in nature. She passed away on January 9, 1995, at her home in Berkeley, California.

Honors and Awards

Elizabeth Roboz-Einstein received many awards and honors for her important work:

• The University of California, Berkeley offers a special fellowship in her honor. It's called the Elizabeth Roboz Einstein Fellowship. It helps students who are studying how the brain develops.
• She received the Me daglia d'Oro di Milano award from the International Society for Neurochemistry in 1970.
• A special issue of the science journal Neurochemical Research was dedicated to her in 1984.
• In 1965, she was named one of the ten Distinguished Women in the Bay Area by the San Francisco Examiner.
• She received the Raskob Faculty Award in 1956 from Georgetown University.