Baruj Benacerraf

Baruj Benacerraf (born 29 October, 1920) is a US immunologist born in Venezuela, son of a Jewish family originating from  North Africa, who shared the 1980 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the "discovery of the Major histocompatibility complex genes which encode cell surface molecules important for the immune system's distinction between self and non-self". His brother is well-known philosopher Paul Benacerraf.

Born in Caracas, his parents were Sephardic Jews: his father was born in the Spanish Morocco and his mother in Algeria. Dr. Benacerraf moved to Paris from Venezuela with his family in 1925. After having come back to Venezuela, in 1940 he emigrated to the USA and in 1943, he became a naturalized citizen. He earned his B.S. at Columbia University School of General Studies. He then went on to attain the degree of Doctor of Medicine from the Medical College of Virginia, the only school to which he was accepted.

After his medical internship and US Army service (1945–48), and working at he military hospital of Nancy, he became a researcher at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons (1948–50). He performed research in Paris (1950–6), relocated to New York University (1956–68), moved to the National Institutes of Health (1968–70), then joined Harvard University (1970–91), concurrently serving the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston (1980). He began studies of allergies in 1948, and discovered the Ir (immune response) genes that govern transplant rejection (1960s).

In 1990, Benacerraf also received National Medal of Science for his contributions to the world of medicine.