Sergey Fedoroff was born in Daugavtils, Latvia, on February 20, 1925. After the war he interrupted his medical studies at the University of Tubingen to come to Canada. He joined the Department of Anatomy at the University of Saskatchewan as an assistant animal keeper, obtained his PhD in 1958 and his DSc in 1984, and was head of the department from 1964 to 1987.
In 1950 he became involved in the incipient field of tissue culture, developed a world-class tissue culture and neurobiology research program, and for over thirty years offered a unique summer course in tissue culture that markedly enhanced the research careers of persons from all over the world. This led to the presidency of the Tissue Culture Association and its Lifetime Achievement Award, and to the presidencies of the Canadian Federation of Biological Societies and the PanAmerican Association of Anatomists. Fedoroff edited fifteen books on tissue culture, contributed twenty-six chapters to other books, and published over 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals. He remains highly involved in the Saskatchewan Neuroscience Network.
W. Earle DeCoteau