John Jacob Abel was a significant American biochemist

Biochemistry

Biochemistry, sometimes called biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes in living organisms, including, but not limited to, living matter. Biochemistry governs all living organisms and living processes...

 and pharmacologist

Pharmacology

Pharmacology is the branch of medicine and biology concerned with the study of drug action. More specifically, it is the study of the interactions that occur between a living organism and chemicals that affect normal or abnormal biochemical function...

.

Born near Cleveland

Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...

, Ohio

Ohio

Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

, he graduated with a Ph.D. in 1883 from the University of Michigan

University of Michigan

The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...

. In 1891 he founded and chaired the first department of pharmacology in the United States at the University of Michigan. In 1893, he went on to chair the pharmacology department at Johns Hopkins University

Johns Hopkins University

The Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university based in Baltimore, Maryland, United States...

. In 1897, he was the second to isolate epinephrine

Epinephrine

Epinephrine is a hormone and a neurotransmitter. It increases heart rate, constricts blood vessels, dilates air passages and participates in the fight-or-flight response of the sympathetic nervous system. In chemical terms, adrenaline is one of a group of monoamines called the catecholamines...

, also known as adrenaline (the first was Napoleon Cybulski

Napoleon Cybulski

Napoleon Cybulski was a Polish physiologist and one of pioneers of endocrinology and electroencephalography. The discoverer of adrenaline, he was the first to isolate and identify the substance in 1895.-References:...

 in 1895), although the extracts he produced have been shown to be mostly an inactive metabolite and the first pure extracts were produced by the Japanese Jokichi Takamine

Jokichi Takamine

was a Japanese chemist.-Early life and education:Takamine was born in Takaoka, Toyama Prefecture, in November 1854. His father was a doctor; his mother a member of a family of sake brewers. He spent his childhood in Kanazawa, capital of present-day Ishikawa Prefecture in central Honshū, and was...

 (1854–1922) who patented the formulation under the name adrenalin. He later formulated the idea of the artificial kidney

Kidney

The kidneys, organs with several functions, serve essential regulatory roles in most animals, including vertebrates and some invertebrates. They are essential in the urinary system and also serve homeostatic functions such as the regulation of electrolytes, maintenance of acid–base balance, and...

 and in 1914 he isolated amino acids from the blood

Blood

Blood is a specialized bodily fluid in animals that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells....

.

He spent years unsuccessfully searching for the pituitary hormone, unaware that he was in fact looking for several hormones. In 1926, he reported the isolation and crystallization

Crystallization

Crystallization is the process of formation of solid crystals precipitating from a solution, melt or more rarely deposited directly from a gas. Crystallization is also a chemical solid–liquid separation technique, in which mass transfer of a solute from the liquid solution to a pure solid...

 of insulin

Insulin

Insulin is a hormone central to regulating carbohydrate and fat metabolism in the body. Insulin causes cells in the liver, muscle, and fat tissue to take up glucose from the blood, storing it as glycogen in the liver and muscle....

, though this announcement was met with considerable scepticism and not generally accepted for many years.

Abel also co-founded the Journal of Biological Chemistry

Journal of Biological Chemistry

The Journal of Biological Chemistry is a weekly peer-reviewed scientific journal that was established in 1905. Since 1925 it is published by the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. It covers research in any area of biochemistry or molecular biology. The editor-in-chief is...

with Christian Archibald Herter

Christian Archibald Herter (physician)

-Further reading:...

 in 1905 and the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics

Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics

The Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics is a peer-reviewed pharmacology journal published since 1909 by the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics...

in 1909.

Abel was one of the many students of Oswald Schmiederberg who founded pharmacology departments all over the world including Genoa, Heidelberg, Berlin, Padua, Japan, Edinburgh, and the United States. Oswald Schmiederberg was an ordinarius in pharmacology in Dorpat (1869-1872) and the University of Strassburg in France (1872-1918) and one of the major influences in the spread and development of pharmacology in the 19th century.