The Israel Chemistry Society medal will be awarded in the Knesset to Eli Horvitz and Professor Meir Wilchek

Eli Horvitz is an industrialist who made Teva the largest company in Israel, the flagship of Israeli industry and the leading company in the world in the production of generic drugs The

The Israel Chemistry Society medal will be awarded in the Knesset next month to Eli Horvitz and Professor Meir Wilchek. The ceremony will be held in the Knesset on the fourth of January in the presence of ministers, members of the Knesset, heads of the academic system and the chemical industry, guests from abroad and hundreds of faculty members and students from all universities and technological colleges.

Eli Horvitz is an industrialist who made Teva the largest company in Israel, the flagship of Israeli industry and the world's leading company in the production of generic drugs. Teva currently employs about 40 workers in dozens of factories and subsidiaries around the world, but at the same time it maintains its management and development core in Israel through about 6000 workers.

Professor Meir Wilchek is the father of the technology, known as affinity chromatography for protein separation and purification, which is used in every biochemical laboratory around the world and in the pharmaceutical industry. This technology led to the establishment of more than 75 knowledge-intensive companies worldwide, with a sales volume of over 70 billion dollars per year.

The Israel Chemistry Society medal is the highest honor awarded by this association, which was founded in 1933 by Jewish scientists from Germany, and is considered the oldest scientific association in Israel. Its main goals are the promotion of research and teaching in chemistry in universities, technological colleges and schools, and the promotion of the chemical industry in the State of Israel.

The President of the Israel Chemical Society, Professor Ehud Keinan from the Shulich Faculty of Chemistry at the Technion, said that 2011 was declared by the United Nations as the International Year of Chemistry and all national and international chemistry organizations are preparing accordingly. The goal is to promote the image of the chemical sciences and the chemical industry, and to emphasize their great contribution to health, agriculture, the economy and the solution of the hardships of the human race, such as water, food, energy, environmental quality and raw materials problems.

"Since before the establishment of the state until today, chemistry is one of the prominent areas of scientific excellence in the State of Israel," stressed Professor Keenan. "The science of chemistry is the basis and core of all experimental sciences, and the basis of all knowledge-intensive industries. The chemical industry in Israel stands out in its contribution to the national economy, with chemical products accounting for 25% of all exports of the State of Israel. There are currently over 7000 chemists, 5000 chemical engineers, 1000 chemistry teachers and a large number of other professionals working as chemists, such as biochemists, biotechnologists, food, mineral and energy engineers, working in the State of Israel.

The CEO of the Israel Chemical Society, Hana Atli, said that during the festive event in the Knesset, two new stamps issued by the Stamp Service in honor of the event will be unveiled. The Green Chemical Industry Award will also be awarded to an Israeli industrial plant. She added that the International Year of Chemistry also marks the centenary of Marie Curie winning the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the contribution of women to science.

Eli Horvitz

Although he is not defined as a chemist according to his education, Eli Horvitz's contribution to the chemical industry in Israel is extraordinary, not only in national terms, but according to global standards. He led the Teva Group for 35 years and brought a small and unknown pharmaceutical company to the status of the world's leading company in the field of generic drugs. These achievements were achieved by implementing a corporate culture of excellence and strategic management based on a long-term vision, while taking leadership and responsibility for the company's future.

Eli Horvitz was born in Jerusalem in 1932. In 1953, after completing his economics studies at the branch of the Hebrew University in Tel Aviv, Eli Horvitz began his career as a junior employee at the pharmaceutical company "Asia" and in 1976 was appointed CEO of the company. With a long-term strategic view, Eli Horvitz initiated the merger of several Israeli pharmaceutical companies into one company, named Teva, and headed it for many years, first as CEO (1976-2002) and then as Chairman of the Board of Directors until 2009.

In addition to Eli Horvitz's high commitment to the Teva company, he mobilized to promote many public and social goals in Israel and to support scientific, educational and cultural activities in the country. He served in a very long series of public positions, such as president of the Association of Manufacturers, chairman of the Coordination Bureau of Economic Organizations, chairman of the Israel Export Institute, chairman of the board of directors of Bank Leumi, chairman of the Israeli Task Force, chairman of the Jerusalem Development Authority , member of the advisory committee of the Bank of Israel, member of the board of trustees of the Weizmann Institute and Tel Aviv University, and more.

His extensive and varied public and industrial activity earned him a long series of awards from academic and public bodies in Israel, including an honorary doctorate from the Technion, the Weizmann Institute of Science, Ben-Gurion University, Tel Aviv University, and Bar Ilan University. He is the recipient of the Industry Award, the Jubilee Award and the Israel Award for lifetime achievement and special contribution to society and the country.

Professor Meir Wilchek

Prof. Wilczek was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1935. During World War II he stayed in the Soviet Union and was transferred to Siberia. His father, a community rabbi in Warsaw, was murdered along with most of his family. In 1949 he immigrated to Israel with his mother and sister and settled in Rehovot. After his military service in the Air Force, he studied chemistry and physics at Bar-Ilan University, completing his bachelor's degree in 1960, and in 1965 he completed his doctoral studies in the Department of Biophysics at the Weizmann Institute of Science. During his studies, he worked as a chief chemist at the "Yade" company and then joined the faculty of the biophysics department at the Weizmann Institute. He held senior positions at the institute, such as head of the biophysics department, head of the professors' council, and dean of the faculty of biochemistry and biophysics. He was a visiting scientist at the US National Institutes of Health, served as a consultant to biotechnology companies and served on many professional committees, including the Shamgar Committee.

Prof. Wilchek published more than 400 scientific articles. He is best known for developing the modern concept of affinity between biological molecules, and for his applications of this concept in various fields of the life sciences. In 1968, Wilchek, together with his partners, developed a method called affinity chromatography, which revolutionized the isolation of biochemical substances and paved new ways in biology, biotechnology, chemistry, nanotechnology and many other fields, including physics. She led and contributed to many modern developments in the life sciences, such as DNA chips and protein chips. The method has a particularly profound effect on medicine. Thus, for example, it considerably accelerated the development of all protein-based drugs. This technology led to the establishment of dozens of knowledge-rich companies around the world, with a sales volume that increased from 40 billion dollars in 2008 to 70 billion this year. In addition to this, he developed the use of avidin-biotin technology for diagnosing diseases, for isolating biological materials for biotechnological and nanotechnological uses, and in biomedical research. The system allowed many laboratories to give up the need for radioactive materials.

Prof. Wilchek was widely recognized for his research: he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Waterloo in Canada, from Bar-Ilan University, from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland and from the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. He is the recipient of the Wolf Prize for Medicine, the Israel Prize for Biotechnology, the Outstanding Clinical Chemist Award from the International Federation of Clinical Chemists, the Christian Anfinsen Award of the Protein Society, the Wilhelm-Exner Medal from Austria and the Emet Award in Chemistry. He is a member of the Israeli National Academy of Sciences, an honorary member of the Society of Biological Chemists in the USA, and a foreign member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. At the Weizmann Institute he holds the chair of molecular biology named after Mark Gottwirt.