The roles of Chaim Weizmann as an internationally renowned politician,
as one of the founding fathers of
the State of Israel, and ultimately as its first President, are described in detail in his
biographies and Internet references.
Less generally known is his role as a scientist, specifically as a pioneering biochemist.
During his lifetime, in addition to his
voluminous political correspondence and writings, he published some 100 scientific
papers and was awarded, alone or jointly, some 110 patents. Best known is probably
his work on the
acetone-butanol fermentation process,
which is in fact one of the earliest examples of what came to be
known as biotechnology.
The laboratory, and Dr. Weizmann's private office,
were housed in The Daniel Sieff Research Institute,
in the northwest corner of the original Sieff Institute Building. Upon Weizmann's death in 1952, his
sister, Dr. Anna Weizmann, took over the laboratory and ran it until she
herself passed away in 1965.
When the expanding Daniel Sieff Research Institute
complex was rededicated as the
Weizmann Institute of Science
on November 2, 1949, in honor of Chaim Weizmann's 75th birthday,
the original Sieff Institute became the Department of Chemistry.
It was later renamed The Department of Organic
Chemistry, and part of the Department is housed in the Sieff building to the
present day.
Visits to the laboratory are possible by pre-arrangement with the Levinson
Visitors Center.
