Eva Neer papers

Eva Julia (Augenblick) Neer (1937-2000), B.A., 1957, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massachusetts and Barnard College, New York, New York; M.D., 1963, Columbia University, New York, New York, was a Professor of Biochemistry at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts and a researcher in biochemistry and cytology with a specialization in proteins. Neer was the second woman at Harvard Medical School to receive a tenured professorship.

Eva Neer was born in 28 October 1937 in Warsaw, Poland; her parents left Poland in 1939 when Neer was a year old and went first to Brazil before coming to the United States in the mid-1940s. Neither of Neer’s parents were able to continue their academic careers after moving to New York City. Neer attended Bronxville High School, graduating in 1955. She attended Radcliffe College and graduated from Barnard College in 1957, after which she attended medical school at Columbia University, receiving her M.D. in 1963. Neer held post-graduate positions at Georgetown University, Washington, D.C. and Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut before coming to Harvard Medical School in 1966.

Neer’s first position at Harvard Medical School was as a post-doctoral fellow in Guido Guidotti’s laboratory, purifying adenylyl and guanylyl cyclase from adrenal medulla to better understand the enzyme that generates the universal second messenger cAMP. In 1976, she was appointed Assistant Professor in Biochemistry; she received full professorship in 1991. She was the second woman at Harvard Medical School to receive a tenured professorship. Neer also held a position as a basic scientist from 1976 on in the Cardiovascular Division of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts.

After 1976, Neer concentrated on cellular proteins and, from 1986 on, was involved in a long-term research partnership with David Clapham on G protein signal transduction. Neer and Clapham’s work was responsible for a shift in the science surrounding which G protein α subunit activated the ion channel responsible for vagal-mediated slowing of heart rate. Neer and Clapham were established that the Gβγ subunit was responsible for activating the ion channel; their research results were the subject of substantial controversy from their initial publication in Nature in 1987 until final outside laboratory confirmation in 1994. Neer worked with the G proteins project until shortly before her death.

While at Harvard, Neer served as chair of the Board of Tutors in Biochemical Sciences and was the Associate Master of the Cannon Society. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and received awards from the American Heart Association (the Basic Research Prize), the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (the Excellence in Science Award), and the National Institutes of Health (the Merit Award).

Eva Augenblick married Robert Neer after they met during her time at Radcliffe College; the couple had two children, Robert and Richard. Both children and her husband survived Neer’s death from breast cancer in 2000 at age 62.