Nathan Sharon (; November 1925
23/24 November 2005, accessed 21 June 2011 – 17 June 2011 "Prof. Nathan Sharon dec'd"
. ''Avalim'' Notices (in Hebrew), 19 June 2011) was an Israeli

biochemist Biochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. They study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. Biochemists study DNA, proteins and Cell (biology), cell parts. The word "biochemist" is a portmanteau of ...

Biography

Sharon was born in 1925 in

Brest-Litovsk Brest, formerly Brest-Litovsk and Brest-on-the-Bug, is a city in south-western Belarus at the border with Poland opposite the Polish town of Terespol, where the Bug and Mukhavets rivers meet, making it a border town. It serves as the admini ...

, then in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

(now Brest,

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

). He

emigrated Emigration is the act of leaving a resident country or place of residence with the intent to settle elsewhere (to permanently leave a country). Conversely, immigration describes the movement of people into one country from another (to permanentl ...

Mandate Palestine The Mandate for Palestine was a League of Nations mandate for British administration of the territories of Palestine and Transjordanwhich had been part of the Ottoman Empire for four centuriesfollowing the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in Wo ...

with his family in 1934 and settled in

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

.CV of Nathan Sharon (in Hebrew)
Palmach web site Concurrent with his high school studies, Sharon joined the Gadna military youth program in 1941, and following his graduation from school, in 1943, he joined the

Palmach The Palmach (Hebrew: , acronym for , ''Plugot Maḥatz'', "Strike Phalanges/Companies") was the elite combined strike forces and sayeret unit of the Haganah, the paramilitary organization of the Yishuv (Jewish community) during the period of th ...

, serving until 1945. During the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

, Sharon served in the Science Corps of the

Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...

, attaining the rank of lieutenant colonel, and worked on the development of gas flame throwers. Sharon studied chemistry at the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...

. In 1950, he graduated and, in 1953, he was awarded a doctorate. In 1954, he joined the faculty of the Department for Biophysics at the

Weizmann Institute of Science The Weizmann Institute of Science ( ''Machon Weizmann LeMada'') is a Public university, public research university in Rehovot, Israel, established in 1934, fourteen years before the State of Israel was founded. Unlike other List of Israeli uni ...

, headed by professor

Ephraim Katzir Ephraim Katzir (; – 30 May 2009) was an Israeli biophysicist and Labor Party politician. He was the president of Israel from 1973 until 1978. Biography Efraim Katchalski (later Katzir) was the son of Yudel-Gersh (Yehuda) and Tzilya Katchals ...

, where he became a professor in 1968. In 1974, he was appointed head of the department, a position he held intermittently until his retirement in 1990. He also served as dean of the Faculty of Chemistry and Physics and was a visiting professor at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

universities and the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. He was also a member of the senate of the

Open University of Israel The Open University of Israel (, ''Ha-Universita ha-Ptuha'') is a distance education, distance-education university in Israel. It is one of ten public universities in Israel recognized by the Council of Higher Education (CHE). Open University ...

and a member of the council of the Tel Aviv-Yafo Academic College. He served as editor of "World of Science" broadcast on Israel Radio, editor of the journal "''Mada''" (Science) and science and technology editor of the ''

Haaretz ''Haaretz'' (; originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , , ) is an List of newspapers in Israel, Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel. The paper is published in Hebrew lan ...

'' newspaper. He was a leading figure in the research of

carbohydrate A carbohydrate () is a biomolecule composed of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and oxygen (O) atoms. The typical hydrogen-to-oxygen atomic ratio is 2:1, analogous to that of water, and is represented by the empirical formula (where ''m'' and ''n'' ...

and

glycoprotein Glycoproteins are proteins which contain oligosaccharide (sugar) chains covalently attached to amino acid side-chains. The carbohydrate is attached to the protein in a cotranslational or posttranslational modification. This process is known a ...

for more than fifty years. He authored several seminal works on

lectins Lectins are carbohydrate-binding proteins that are highly specific for sugar groups that are part of other molecules, so cause agglutination of particular cells or precipitation of glycoconjugates and polysaccharides. Lectins have a role in r ...

and

glycoconjugates In molecular biology and biochemistry, glycoconjugates are the classification family for carbohydrates – referred to as glycans – which are covalently linked with chemical species such as proteins, peptides, lipids, and other compounds. Gly ...

, including the discovery of lectins, their interactions with carbohydrates, and their subsequent use in laboratory research and diagnostics. In 1992, he was elected to the

Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, based in Jerusalem, was established in 1961 by the State of Israel to foster contact between Israeli scholars in the sciences and humanities and create a think tank for advising the government on res ...

. He died on 17 June 2011 at the age of 85.

Honours and awards

Sharon received numerous honorary degrees and awards including: *1987: Weizmann Prize for Sciences. *1987: Honorary doctorate from the

University of Paris The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...

. *1989: Bijvoet Medal of the

Bijvoet Center for Biomolecular Research The Bijvoet Centre for Biomolecular Research is a research institute at Utrecht University. The Bijvoet Centre performs Structural biology, research on the relation between the structure and function of biomolecules, including proteins and lipids, ...

, Utrecht University, NL *1994:

Israel Prize The Israel Prize (; ''pras israél'') is an award bestowed by the State of Israel, and regarded as the state's highest cultural honor. History Prior to the Israel Prize, the most significant award in the arts was the Dizengoff Prize and in Israel ...

in biochemistry.

Family

Sharon married Rachel (Itzikson) in 1948 and has two daughters, Esther (Esty) Sharon, and Osnat Bairey. He was the nephew of

Pinchas Sapir Pinchas Sapir (; born Pinchas Kozlowski 15 October 1906 – 12 August 1975) was an Israeli politician during the first three decades following the country's founding. He held two important ministerial posts, Minister of Finance (1963–68 and ...

, the former Israeli Finance Minister and the brother of

Shmuel Shtrikman Shmuel (Mula) Shtrikman (; 21 October 1930 to 11 November 2003) was an Israeli physicist, and a professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science. Winner of the Israel Prize for Research in Physics in 2003. Biography Born in Brest, Belarus (then Po ...

, who was awarded the 2001 Israel Prize for physics.

Selected works

Sharon published over 400 papers in international scientific journals and wrote or edited eight books in English and Hebrew. His published works include: * ''Lectins'', co-authored with Halina Lis (Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003 (2nd edition)).

References

External links