L. Andrew Staehelin papers

L. Andrew Staehelin was born on February 10, 1939, in Sydney, Australia and passed away on September 29th, 2022, in Boulder, Colorado. Staehelin received his diploma (1963) and PhD. (1966) from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich, and then accepted a research scientist position with the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research in Wellington, New Zealand.

In 1970, Staehelin took an assistant professor position at the University of Colorado Boulder, Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology (MCDB). By 1978 he became a full professor, and a professor emeritus in 2006. He published over three hundred articles and many books, two of these are Biosynthesis of the photosynthetic apparatus, 1984 and Photosynthesis III: Photosynthetic Membranes and Light Harvesting Systems. One of his notable contributions to electron microscopy was the introduction of high-pressure freezing technique that became the standard technique for observing the structure of cells at the nanoscale.

He was the recipient of several awards, including the Humboldt award Humboldt Foundation, 1978; research fellow Harvard University, 1969-1970; Science Teacher award University Colorado, 1984; Outstanding Faculty award University Colorado Boulder Parents Association, 2001; Highly Cited Researcher ISI, 2004, Haselkorn Scholar award, University Chicago, 2006; grantee National Institutes of Health, 1971-2006; US Department of Agriculture, 1994-2005; NASA, 1997-2006; honorary senior fellow University Melbourne, Australia, 1998; American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), 2005; and membership in the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. In addition to these awards Staehelin established the Plant Cell Wall Gordon Conference starting in 2017 and was a member of numerous organizations, boards, and panels.