Dr. Paul A. Weiss
Award Name : National Medal of Science
Year of Award : 1979
Award for : Biology
Location : Vienna, Vienna, Austria
Dr. Paul A. Weiss, a biologist who won the National Medal of Science for his pioneering work in the theory of cellular development. Paul Weiss was born on March 21, 1898, in Vienna, Austria, the son of Carl S. Weiss, a successful businessman, and Rosalie Kohn Weiss. Weiss went to the United States to work in the Yale University Laboratory from 1931 to 1933. From Yale he moved to the University of Chicago (1933–54), but his research on tissue organization and development was interrupted during World War II, when, working for the U.S. government, he sought improved methods of surgical nerve repair. He developed a technique for the sutureless splicing of severed nerves, for which accomplishment he received a merit citation from the U.S. War and Naval departments. He became a U.S. citizen in 1939. Among his many works, including several hundred scientific papers, is Principles of Development(1939), a textbook in experimental embryology. In 1979 Weiss was awarded the National Medal of Science. He died on September 8, 1989 in New York, USA.