Wolf Vishniac. Typed letter signed, dated October 28, 1953, on Yale University stationery, department of microbiology. written to Dr. Seymour Hutner of the Haskins Labs (NYC). $125
"Wolf Vladimir Vishniac (April 22, 1922 December 10, 1973) was an American microbiologist, son of famed photographer Roman Vishniac [of Warsaw Ghetto photographs fame]. Educated at Brooklyn College and Stanford University, he was a professor of biology at the University of Rochester. He died on a research trip to the Antarctic attempting to retrieve equipment in a crevice. The crater Vishniac on Mars is named in his honor. Wolf Vishniac contributed greatly to the search for life on Mars by developing a special miniature laboratory that could be transported to that planet, known as the "Wolf Trap". This research was supported by a NASA grant started in 1959, the very first ever for the biological sciences." --Wiki
In his obituary for Vishniac Carl Sagan remarked that the Wolf Trap was remarkable and the first of its type, being the leader of an evolutionary development of such microbiological instrumentation, particularly for the Viking landing mission (summer of 1976) on which Vishiac worked on from 1960 forward.
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