Title:

Letter from Simon Flexner, Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research to Michael Heidelberger

Creator:

Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research
Flexner, Simon

Recipient:

Heidelberger, Michael

Date:

23 June 1924

Description:

Flexner, the director of the Rockefeller Institute, here encouraged Heidelberger to pursue the possibility, not realized at the time, of obtaining X-ray images of crystals of hemoglobin, the red, oxygen-carrying pigment protein in the blood. (Such X-ray photographs eventually served to elucidate the three-dimensional structure of hemoglobin in 1953.) Heidelberger had perfected techniques for making large quantities of pure crystalline horse hemoglobin, with its oxygen-carrying property intact and needed for studies of the uptake and release of oxygen in the blood, while working in the biochemical laboratory of Donald D. Van Slyke at the hospital of the Rockefeller Institute in 1921/22.. Flexner also noted a new trend towards the application of chemistry in immunology, a trend which Heidelberger would help to substantially advance over the next two decades.

Location:

Box: 2. Folder: 2

Rights:

Courtesy of Michael Heidelberger.

Disclaimer:

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Genre:

Letters (correspondence)

Subject:

Crystallography, X-Ray and Allergy and Immunology

Format:

Text

Extent:

1 pages

Language:

English

Legacy ID:

DHBBKM

NLM ID:

101584940X152

Profiles Collection:

The Michael Heidelberger Papers

Shareable Link:

https://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/101584940X152

Story Section:

Biographical Information