6 Dr. Asima Chatterjee

Dr. Asima Chatterjee

Time period: 1917 – 2006

Subject: Biochemistry

Biography:

Asima Chatterjee was born on September 23, 1917 and was an Indian organic chemist. During this time period, education was not accessible for females. Luckily, her father who was a doctor was supportive in her education and inspired her in medicine. One of her first achievement was becoming the first woman to receive a doctorate in science from an Indian university. Since then, she has been the recipient of several awards such as the S S Bhatnagar award, the C V Raman award, the P C Ray award and the Padma Bhushan, the third highest civilian award.

Summary of their contributions:

Asima Chatterjee was a well known organic chemist known for her work in medicinal chemistry. Her philosophy was to work as long as she live. This work ethics and passion allowed her to stay motivated in various medicinal research such as vinca alkaloids, coumarins, anti-epileptic drugs, anti-malarial drugs etc. Over the years, she has published more than 400 research papers in national and international journals. Furthermore, in 1940, she was the founder and head of the chemistry department in Lady Brabourne College, Kolkata. In 1962, her dedication and research allowed her to come the first woman scientist to adorn a chair of any University in India.

Integration with the BC Secondary Science Curriculum:

In the grade 12 science, anatomy and physiology 12, a core content talks about the lymphatic and immune system. A subunit of this is related to cancer and mediation of cancer. Due to Dr. Asima Chatterjee passion and commitment in plant medicine, the alkaloids are still used as chemotherapeutic agents. This has been a medical breakthrough in science as cancer has always been known as an incurable disease. In addition, her work can also be mentioned in environmental science 11 as one of the content piece is parasitism. Since Dr. Asima Chatterjee also had contribution in anti-malarial drugs, it would be awesome to integrate this piece of information to the students.

References:

https://thewire.in/gender/asima-chatterjee-alkaloids-phytomedicine-antimalarial-bhatnagar-google

https://medium.com/sci-illustrate-stories/asima-chatterjee-1ca581dc542f#:~:text=Asima%20worked%20for%20almost%2040,use%2C%20called%20Ayush%2D56.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/malaria/symptoms-causes/syc-20351184

https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/science/12/anatomy-and-physiology

https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/science/11/environmental-science