For his research on the relation between vitamin A and the eye, George Wald, an instructor and tutor in Biology, has been awarded the annual $1000 Eli Lilly and Company Prize in Biological Chemistry, it was learned yesterday.

Wald explained the well-known observation that animals and men deprived of vitamin A become night-blind, by demonstrating that the light-sensitive pigment of most rods participates directly in a retinal cycle with vitamin A.

From the rods of fresh-water fishes, he extracted the vitamin-nature of the substance now called vitamin A-2. From chicken retina he obtained the first light-sensitive pigment to be found in these structures.

Studied Abroad

Born 33 years ago in New York City, Wald attended New York and Columbia Universities. From 1932 to 1934, as a National Research Fellow, he served in the laboratories of some of the most famous biologists of Europe. Five years ago Wald came to Harvard as a Tutor in Biochemical Sciences, and the following year secured his present position in the Biology Department.

Among the scientists with whom Wald was associated during his training abroad, were Professors Otto Warburg, of Berlin-Dahlem, Otto Meyerhoff, of Heidelberg, and Paul Karrer, of Zurich. Wald's results are the fruits of many months of painstaking experiments with human, animal, and fish eyes.