Shyamala Gopalan Kamala Harris Mother Bio Wiki Age Height Parents Family Husband and Cause of Death
Shyamala Gopalan was a Tamil Indian-America breast cancer researcher and civil rights activist. She was the mother of both Maya Harris, a political commentator and a lawyer, and Kamala Harris the US Vice President.
She was born on April 7, 1938, in Madras (now Chennai), in the Mandras Province (now Tamil Nadu), of British India. Gopalan passed on when she was70 years oldand celebrated her birthday onApril 7every year.
She was a woman of short stature who stood at a height of5 ft 1 in(Approx 1.55 m).
Gopalan was born to her parentsRajamandP.V. Gopalanin Chennai, in the Tamil Nadu Province of British India. Her father was a Tamil diplomat who also took part in the freedom movement. She had a brother calledBalachandran. Her parents were broad-minded in raising her and her siblings.
In addition, Gopalan was a gifted singer of Carnatic music and was the winner of a national competition as a teenager. She moved to theUnited Statesat the age of 19 years old to attend the University of California in Berkeley. However, there is not much information in regard to her mother.
She was born into a family of four children. Gopalan was the oldest child ofRajamandP.V. Gopalan. She had two sisters and one brotherBalachandran.However, her sister’s names are still away from the limelight.
She was the wife ofDonald Harris,a professor of economics at Stanford who was born in Jamaica. Gopalan had two daughters with Harris named Kamala Harris andMaya Harris. She was also the grandmother toMeena Harris,Ella Emhoff,Cole Emhoff,and mother-in-law to Kamala Harris’s husbandDouglas Emhoff, and Maya Harris’s husband, Tony West. Gopalan was a great inspiration to her daughters.
The late Gopalan was married to the love of her lifeDonald Harris, a Jamaican-American professor of economics at Stanford University. The two met at Berkeley where they were both involved in the civil rights movement. Together they were blessed with two daughters, Kamala Harris, and Maya Harris. Gopalan and Donald’s marriage ended in divorce in 1971 when Kamala was only seven years old. She raised her daughters as a single mother instilling good morals in her children.
Gopalan attended Lady Irwin College of the University of Delhi where she received her undergraduate degree at the age of 19. She later enrolled in the University of California, Berkeley, and graduated with a Ph.D. degree in Nutrition and Endocrinology at the age of 25. Gopalan’s essay was known as “The isolation and purification of a trypsin inhibitor from whole wheat flour.”
She was an American by Nationality and belonged to the Indian-Tamil ethnicity
Gopalan passed on, on February 11, 2009, in Oakland, California, United States from colon cancer. She died at the age of 7o leaving behind her two daughters and granddaughter.
She was a member of Tamil Brahmin. Tamil Brahmin was a privileged elite in Hunduis’s ancient caste hierarchy.
Gopalan was a Tamil Indian-American breast cancer researcher and civil rights activist. She carried out research at UC Berkeley’s Department of Zoology and cancer research Lab. Gopalan worked at both the University of Illinois and the University of Wisconsin as a breast cancer researcher. She also worked at the Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research and McGill University Faculty of Medicine for 16 years.
Moreover, Gopalan worked as a peer reviewer for the National Institutes of Health as well as a site visit team member for the Federal Advisory Committee. In addition, she also served on the President’s Special Commission concerning Breast Cancer. Gopalan was a mentor to dozens of students in her lab. She worked in the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for her last decade of research.
Gopalan’s research led to the developing of the knowledge of hormones concerning breast cancer. Her efforts in isolating and characterizing the progesterone receptor gene in mice transmuted research on the hormone responsiveness of breast tissue. During her time at Berkeley Laboratory, Gopalan’s lab examined the role of sex steroids in the induction of breast cancers.
Gopalan was a Tamil Indian-American breast cancer researcher and civil rights activist.
She was born in Madras (now Chennai), in the Mandras Province (now Tamil Nadu), of British India.