Max Tishler

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Max Tishler (October 30, 1906 – March 18, 1989) was a scientist at Merck & Co. who led the research teams that synthesized ascorbic acid, riboflavin, cortisone, miamin, pyridoxin, pantothenic acid, nicotinamide, methionine, threonine, and tryptophan. He also led a microbiological group that developed the fermentation processes for actinomycin D, vitamin B12, streptomycin, and penicillin. Tishler invented sulfaquinoxaline for the treatment for coccidiosis.

He was born in Boston in 1906, and was the fifth of six children of European immigrants. His father, a cobbler, abandoned the family when Max was only five years old. As Max grew up he worked to help support his family by working as a bakery delivery boy, and a newsboy. He worked in a pharmacy during the flu pandemic of 1918. He studied chemistry as an undergraduate at Tufts College, and in 1934 he had earned his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Harvard University. He taught for three years at Harvard, then in 1937, he took a position at the Merck. This first research assignment at Merck was to develop an economical process for producing large quantities of riboflavin. In the 1940's he developed a process for the mass-production of cortisone.

In 1970 he retired from Merck, and joined the chemistry department at Wesleyan University. He died in Middletown, Connecticut in 1989. He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth, his son Peter and daughter-in-law Sigrid, his son Carl and daughter-in-law Bonnie, 3 grandchildren, and 4 great-grandchildren.

Honors

• Priestley Medal
• National Medal of Science
• National Inventors Hall of Fame