David Gottlieb (1911–1982), a professor of plant pathology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (1946–1982), was a pioneer in the field of fungal physiology and antibiotics for plants.

Gottlieb is best known for isolation in the 1940s of the strain of Streptomyces from which chloramphenicol was developed,^[1] for his mentoring in the field, and for his editorial work.^[2] He used plant-pathogenic fungi in studies of sterol biosynthesis, respiration, aging, spore germination, and the mechanism of action of antifungal antibiotics. Gottlieb discovered or co-discovered several new antibiotics in addition to chloramphenicol, including filipin, levomycin, and tetrin, and he described the mechanism of action and biosynthesis of several of these and other antibiotics.^[3]

• Guggenheim Fellow, Biology-Plant Science, 1963.
• Fellow, The American Phytopathological Society, 1966.
• Editor for the Annual Review of Phytopathology, 1969–1974.

In his memory, the "David Gottlieb Memorial Award" is given by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for outstanding published research on the biochemistry of plant diseases or plant pathogens.,^[4]

• Gottlieb, D. (Jan. 1961) "'An Evaluation of Criteria and Procedures Used in the Description and Characterization of the Streptomycetes: A Cooperative Study" Appl Microbiol. 9(1): 55–65.
• Gottlieb, D. (1974) "Germination of fungal spores: Biochemical processes during spore germination, Carbohydrate metabolism" 2nd International Symposium on the Fungus Spore.