ROBERTO POLJAK

1932 - 2019

ROBERTO JUAN POLJAK  
Roberto Juan Poljak passed away peacefully at the age of 86 on Thursday May 30, 2019, at his home in Baltimore County. Roberto was born on September 17, 1932 in Buenos Aires, Argentina and married Mabel Amelia Iglesias in 1956. He was a graduate of the University de La Plata, Argentina and pursued his studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The Royal Institution of London, and the MRC in Cambridge U.K. He had a distinguished career in Biophysics, conducting research and teaching at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, the Pasteur Institute in Paris, France and the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology at the University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. His laboratory was the first to report the three-dimensional structure of the human antibody, a major contribution to the field of immunology. He received several awards for his scientific achievements, including the Jacques Monod Prize in France in 1986, the Distinguished Scientist Award from the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research in San Antonio, Texas in 1987, the Louis Jeantet prize in Geneva, Switzerland in 1989, the Gold Medal of the Jimenez Diaz Foundation in Madrid, Spain in 1991 and held the Elkins Professorship from the University of Maryland in 1995 and 1996.Roberto was passionate about music and art. He studied violin as a child and took up painting after retirement. He also enjoyed traveling, reading, entertaining and walking. He was a generous and loving person who extended his care to his colleagues and family.He is survived by his wife of 62 years, Mabel, his daughter, Leonora and son-in-law, Agamemnon, his son, Gustavo and daughter-in-law, Sondang, his sister, Ana Luisa and sister-in-law, Veronica. He has three grand-children, Steven-Andrew, Alicia and Ana Sophia, and one grand-daughter, Lydia Rose. A memorial service will be held at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, June 8 at Epworth United Methodist Church, 600 Warren Road, Cockeysville, Maryland.