orig. Rosalyn Sussman
born July 19, 1921, New York, N.Y., U.S.
U.S. medical physicist.
She received a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois. She developed the technique of radioimmunoassay (RIA) by combining techniques from radioisotope tracing and immunology. RIA proved a very sensitive and simple way to measure tiny concentrations of biological substances or drugs in blood or other body fluids. She originally applied RIA to study blood insulin levels in diabetes mellitus (1959), but the method soon found hundreds of other applications. In 1976 she became the first woman awarded the Albert Lasker Prize, and in 1977 she shared a Nobel Prize with Andrew V. Schally and Roger C.L. Guillemin .