Menachem Luria

Menachem Luria was born in 1943 in Jerusalem

Menachem Luria was born in Jerusalem in 1943. He is the younger son of Bible scholar Ben-Zion Luria and Yehudit Ginzburg, a nurse and public activist. He attended the Hebrew Gymnasium in Jerusalem.

He served in the IDF in Battalion 890 of the Paratroopers Brigade. He began studying at the Hebrew University in 1963 and earned bachelor's and master's degrees in physical chemistry. He completed a doctorate in 1972 on photochemical processes in water solutions, under Professor Gabriel Stein.

He trained in atmospheric chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania in 1973 and worked at the Stanford Research Institute in 1974 and 1975. In 1975 he became a lecturer at the Hebrew University, and he was made full professor in 1989. He headed its School of Applied Science from 1993 to 1997.

His research covers chemical processes in the air, long-range transport of pollutants, and air quality in cities and deserts. He studied the air over the Dead Sea, where bromine compounds break down ozone and turn mercury into reactive forms. He led the Israel Society of Ecology and Environmental Sciences twice and was president of IUAPPA from 2001 to 2004.

He retired in 2011 and continued as an affiliate research professor at the Desert Research Institute in Nevada. He married Ora Kreizman in 1965, and they had 3 children. She died in 2004, and in 2009 he married Naama Eldad-Marbach, daughter of Israel Eldad.