Dorothea Rudnick (January 17, 1907 – January 10, 1990) was an American embryologist, who also made contributions as a scientific editor and translator.

Early life and education

Dorothea Rudnick was born in

Oconomowoc, Wisconsin Oconomowoc ( ) is a city in Waukesha County, Wisconsin, United States. The name was derived from Coo-no-mo-wauk, the Potawatomi term for "waterfall." The population was 15,712 at the 2010 census. The city is partially adjacent to the Town of Oco ...

in 1907, and was raised in

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. Her father Paul Rudnick was chief chemist for Armour Laboratories, and both of her brothers became physicists. As a student at Parker High School she won the $2500 grand prize in an essay contest sponsored by the ''Chicago Daily Tribune''. She earned her PhD at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

in 1931 under zoologist Benjamin Harrison Willier. Her dissertation was titled "Thyroid Forming Potencies of the Early Chick Blastoderm."

Career

Dr. Rudnick spent most of her academic career at

Albertus Magnus College Albertus Magnus College is a private Catholic university in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded by the Dominican Sisters of St. Mary of the Springs (now Dominican Sisters of Peace), it is located in the Prospect Hill neighborhood of New Haven, nea ...

, as a professor in the biology department from 1940 until she retired in 1977, and as an emeritus professor after retirement. She also had ongoing research affiliation with the nearby

Osborn Memorial Laboratories {{Coord, 41.3162, -72.9235, display=title The Osborn Memorial Laboratories in New Haven, Connecticut were built in 1913 as the home for biology at Yale University. In the past, they contained both zoology and botany, in the two wings on Sachem S ...

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

. Among her research collaborators was biologist

Viktor Hamburger Viktor Hamburger (July 9, 1900 – June 12, 2001)Garland E. AllenViktor Hamburger, 1900–2001. National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoirs, 2015, 39 pp. was a German-American professor and embryologist. His collaboration with neuroscien ...

. Rudnick's publications were especially noted for the cell diagrams she hand-drew to explain embryogenesis and other processes. She served as secretary and publications editor of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, and as longtime editor of symposia published by the

Society for Developmental Biology The Society for Developmental Biology (SDB), originally the Society for the Study of Development and Growth, is a professional society for scientists and professionals around the world whose research is focused on the study of the developmental b ...

. Her translation work included a 1967 biography of biologist

Theodor Boveri Theodor Heinrich Boveri (12 October 1862 – 15 October 1915) was a German zoologist, comparative anatomist and co-founder of modern cytology. He was notable for the first hypothesis regarding cellular processes that cause cancer, and for describ ...

, written in German by Fritz Baltzer. Dorothea Rudnick received a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1952.

Personal life

Rudnick lived a somewhat reclusive personal life in a modern house on a hillside in

Hamden, Connecticut Hamden is a town in New Haven County, Connecticut, United States. The town's nickname is "The Land of the Sleeping Giant". The population was 61,169 at the 2020 census. History The peaceful tribe of Quinnipiacs were the first residents of the ...

designed in 1956 by architect

King-lui Wu King-lui Wu (1918 – August 15, 2002) was a Chinese-American architect and professor at Yale University from 1945 to 1988. Life and work King-lui Wu was born in Guangzhou (Canton), China in 1918. Wu's father was a businessman, but despising ...

. She died at

Los Alamos, New Mexico Los Alamos is an census-designated place in Los Alamos County, New Mexico, United States, that is recognized as the development and creation place of the atomic bomb—the primary objective of the Manhattan Project by Los Alamos National Labora ...

early in 1990, just before her 93rd birthday.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rudnik, Dorothea American women biologists American embryologists 1907 births 1990 deaths Scientists from Chicago University of Chicago alumni People from Hamden, Connecticut Albertus Magnus College faculty 20th-century American women scientists Francis W. Parker School (Chicago) alumni