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In memoriam: Kivie Moldave

The ɬÀï·¬ recently learned that ribosome biologist and University of California, Irvine emeritus professor Kivie Moldave died in December. He was 96.

Kivie Moldave

Born in Kiev in 1923, Moldave came to the United States in 1937.  He published his first paper in the Journal of Biological Chemistry , as a graduate student with Richard Winzler at the University of Southern California. At this early stage of his career, he studied amino acid metabolism in the brain and in cancerous tissues. This interest led him to investigate aminoacyl tRNA synthesis, mechanisms of protein translation and the composition of the ribosome. As a mainstay in the field of translation regulation, Moldave participated in the 1985 that contemporaries credit with planting the seed for the Human Genome Project, which was officially launched five years later. 

Moldave’s career took him to biochemistry departments across the U.S., beginning at Tufts University in 1964. He moved to the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine to chair its biochemistry department in 1966 and then to the UC Irvine Medical School in 1970. Though he later moved to the University of California, Santa Cruz to act as academic vice chancellor, UC Irvine would remain his scientific home; he held an emeritus position there after retiring from UCSC in 1992. He also spent time as a visiting professor at Cornell University and at universities in Copenhagen, Jerusalem, Mexico City, Vancouver, London and Paris.

From 1983 to 2005, Moldave was the serial editor of the textbook “Progress in Nucleic Acids Research,” and he served several terms on the editorial board of the JBC. He was a member of numerous societies including the ASBMB, held leadership roles in the biological chemistry division of the American Chemical Society and was a member of advisory committees of the American Cancer Society. In his later years, he served on the executive committee of the UC Irvine Emeriti Association.

Moldave received the United States Public Health Service Career Award in 1963,  the UCI Distinguished Faculty Award for Research in 1982 and the Distinguished University Service Award from the UCI Emeriti Association in 2008.

He is survived by his wife, Rose, to whom he was married for 70 years and his daughter, Ayn, and son, Peter.