Professor Samuel Eiduson died at his residence, 941 Stonehill Lane in Los Angeles 90049 on June 19, 2007 at the age of 88 from esophageal cancer, much mourned by family, friends, and colleagues at the UCLA Neuroscience Department (ND), the Brain Research Institute (BRI), the Departments of Psychiatry and Biological Chemistry as well as the Veteran’s Administration (VA’s) Neurobiochemistry Laboratory, the NIH, and as far away as the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

Born in Buffalo, New York, Dr Eiduson obtained his BS in chemistry at UCLA in 1947 before joining the army as lieutenant in the United States and Pacific theatres. Upon returning, he obtained his PhD under the guidance of Professor Max Dunn at the Chemistry Department at UCLA for work on the metabolism of phenylpyruvic acid and related compounds. One of Neurochemistry’s early pioneers, Professor Eiduson was the prime mover of the four authors of ‘Biochemistry and Behaviour’, which became the first major text for many subsequent investigators.

Dr Eiduson investigated the metabolism of the new neuroleptics at the Neurobiochemistry Laboratory, which he founded at the VA, sharing facilities with Jim Olds and Arne Schiebel before the UCLA Medical School was built. There, besides neuroleptic metabolism, he examined adrenocortical hormones in psychiatric patients and discovered the identity of DOPA and 5HTP decarboxylases, which paved the way for today’s aromatic amino acid decarboxylase. In 1961, he retired from the VA assuming the Associate Professorship in Psychiatry and in Biological Chemistry and establishing the laboratory at the Brain Research Institute. There, he started to work on monoamine oxidase (MOA), gradually dissecting it into its A and B forms by direct chromatography and techniques such as electron spin resonance.

In 1973, Professor Eiduson became full professor and from 1973 to 1974, he was, first, Associate Director of Education and Training at the BRI (Arnie Schiebel was then director) and from 1974 onwards till retirement he held both Associate Director at the BRI and Chairman of the BRI’s Interdepartmental Neuroscience PhD program. In 1976, he carried out studies on MOA on a schizophrenic genetic variant in the north of Sweden during a sabbatical at the Karolinska Institute, St Goran’s Hospital, and in 1983 he spent a sabbatical at Queen Charlottes Hospital, London.

In 1982, the Samuel Eiduson lecture was established at UCLA in his honor whereby outstanding neuroscience students were recognized.

Professor Eiduson served on many NIH committees, most notably the National Institute of Mental Health’s ‘Career Research Scientist Development Award Committee’. He belonged to plethora of organizations, including the ACPN (which he joined in 1968), was the author of about 13 chapters in various books, 59 scientific papers, 46 abstracts presented both at national and international meetings, and was an invited speaker at 30 symposia.

On retirement, as a member of UCLA’ Plato Society, Professor Eiduson spent long hours researching on arcane subjects such as ‘Moca influences on Aztec civilization’, or ‘Mendelssohn’s influence in Modern Music’.

It is difficult to sum up a man’s life —a friend’s life—in a short paper. It suffices to say, Sam will be greatly missed by friends, relatives, and his wife Myrnz Eiduson.