Born in Montreal, he investigated the genetic basis of muscular dystrophy and cystic fibrosis, and helped establish Ontario programs exploring the genetic roots of cancer. He is considered the father of genetic research in Canada.
Son of parents who had emigrated from Eastern Europe. He won a scholarship in chemistry to McGill University, earning a doctorate in 1944. He then studied at the Pasteur Institute in Paris. In 1953 he joined the Connaught Medical Research Laboratories in Toronto. He later joined the University of Toronto and worked there from 1956 to 1985. One of his doctoral students was Joyce Taylor-Papadimitriou.
He helped establish the Department of Genetics at the Hospital for Sick Children as chief geneticist, where he worked from 1970 to 1985. From 1983 to 1994 he was founding director of research at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital (Toronto). He was the founder and first chair of the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto, then called the Department of Medical Cell Biology.
He was the author and co-author, at last count, of more than 147 scientific articles, reviews and articles in magazines and books.
The annual Elinore & Lou Siminovitch Theater Award is named in honor of him and his wife.
He passed away due to illness on April 6, 2021 in Toronto, Ontario at the age of one hundred.
Honors
- In 1941 he won the Anne Molson Prize for Chemistry.
- In 1965, member of the Royal Society of Canada (FRSC).
- In 1967 – Canada Centennial Medal.
- In 1977 – Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee Medal.
- In 1978 he won the Flavelle Medal of the Royal Society of Canada.
- In 1980 he was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada.
- In 1980 – Member of the Royal Society (London) (FRS).
- In 1981 he received the Wightman Award from the Gairdner Foundation.
- In 1981 he received the Izaac Walton Killam Memorial Award.
- In 1988 he was promoted to Companion of the Order of Canada.
- In 1997 he was inducted into the Canadian Medical Hall of Fame.
- In 1999 he was named a foreign associate, and the only Canadian, of the United States National Academy of Sciences.
- In 2012, he was appointed a member of the Order of Ontario.
- He was awarded a Doctor of Science, Honoris Causa from several Canadian universities, including Memorial University, McMaster University, University of Montreal, McGill University, University of Western Ontario, University of Toronto and University of Guelph.
Source: Wikipedia
Louis Siminovitch – CC BY-SA 2.5