MY LIFE IN AND BEYOND THE LABORATORY

Ephraim Katchalski-Katzir grew up in Israel at a time when the State w as coming into being, and like many of those of his generation, partic ipated in its creation and defense. He received his scientific educati on at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and thereafter at the Polytec hnic Institute of Brooklyn, Columbia University, and Harvard Universit y. During and after the establishment of the State, he acted as scient ific consultant to the defense leadership, and continued throughout hi s career to advise the Government of Israel on research and developmen t. His public activities culminated in his election in 1973 as Preside nt of the State of Israel. As one of the founders of the Weizmann Inst itute of Science, he headed the Department of Biophysics for many year s. His research included the study of poly-alpha-amino acids as protei n models, immobilized enzymes, and polymers as chemical reagents. He a lso carried out theoretical and experimental work on the determination of distance distributions and conformational fluctuations in proteins by nonradiative energy-transfer techniques.