R. Rajalakshmi (1926–2007) was an Indian

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 ...

and nutritionist. She developed nutritious, economical diets for Indian families.

Biography

Lakshmi Ramaswami Iyer was born in 1926 in

Quilon Kollam (), also known by its former name Quilon , is an ancient seaport and city on the Malabar Coast of India bordering the Laccadive Sea, which is a part of the Arabian Sea. It is north of the state capital Thiruvananthapuram. The city i ...

Kerala Kerala ( ; ) is a state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile regions of Cochin, Malabar, South ...

to Meenakshi and G.S. Ramaswami Iyer. She added Raja to her given name at the age of five and grew up in Madras, where her father was employed as a postal audit officer. Rajalakshmi attended Wadia College in

Pune Pune (; ; also known as Poona, (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million ...

, earning a mathematics degree in 1945. She taught science in Kanchipuram from 1945 to 1948 and received her teaching certificate from Lady Willingdon Training College in 1949. Rajalakshmi married C. V. Ramakrishnan in 1951. She taught at

Annamalai University , logo = CampusmapofAU.jpg , image = Annamalai University logo.png , image_size = 225px , motto = "With Courage and Faith" , established = , type ...

and earned her MA in philosophy from

Banaras Hindu University Banaras Hindu University (BHU) IAST: kāśī hindū viśvavidyālaya IPA: /kaːʃiː hɪnd̪uː ʋɪʃwəʋid̪jaːləj/), is a collegiate, central, and research university located in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India, and founded in 1916 ...

in 1953. Ramakrishnan became head of the

University of Baroda The Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, formerly Baroda College, is a public university in the city of Vadodara, in Gujarat state, India. Originally established as a college in 1881, it became a university in 1949 after the independence of ...

's biochemistry department in 1955. Rajalakshmi earned a PhD in psychology from

McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Universit ...

in Montreal in 1958. She was mentored by psychologist

Donald O. Hebb Donald Olding Hebb (July 22, 1904 – August 20, 1985) was a Canadian psychologist who was influential in the area of neuropsychology, where he sought to understand how the function of neurons contributed to psychological processes such as l ...

and finished her PhD in under 18 months. Rajalakshmi was hired by the University of Baroda in 1964. She was part of the foods and nutrition department until 1967 when she joined the biochemistry department. She became a full professor in 1976 and headed the department from 1984 to 1986. In the early 1960s, Rajalakshmi managed and revised a UNICEF-sponsored nutrition program. At the time and courses in nutrition were based on Western textbooks that included foods that were either expensive or unavailable in India. With her husband, Rajalakshmi moved to Palo Alto, California in the 1990s to live near her daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren. She and her relatives moved to Seattle, Washington in 2001. She died there from

renal failure Kidney failure, also known as end-stage kidney disease, is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney failure is classified as eit ...

in June 2007.

Personal life

Rajalakshmi was married to C. V. Ramakrishnan. They had two children, Nobel Prize-winning structural biologist

Venkatraman Ramakrishnan Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (born 1952) is an Indian-born British and American structural biologist who shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Thomas A. Steitz and Ada Yonath, "for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome". ...

and

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

microbiologist

Lalita Ramakrishnan Lalita Ramakrishnan (born 1959) is an American microbiologist who is known for her contributions to the understanding of the biological mechanism of tuberculosis. she serves as a professor of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at the Universi ...

Biography

Personal life

References

Further reading