Dr. Amit Lotan received his Ph.D. in biology from Hebrew University, where he worked with United Nations scientists to research protection against jellyfish stings.
His doctorate was based on the toxin injection system of jellyfish. Jellyfish, like the sea louse, sea nettle, corals, sea anemone and other organisms belonging to the phylum Cnidaria, have similar stinging cells and Amit Lotan was basically the first scientist to do a thorough investigation of their mechanism of action at the biochemical level.
The findings were published at the time in the journal Nature, as well as in leading marine biology journals in the 1990s.
During his research, Lotan observed that the clownfish (the same one used as a character in the movie Finding Nemo) was not stung by jellyfish or anemones. He therefore set out to study its mucous lining.
After spending three years in California following his Ph.D., Lotan succeeded in isolating the chemical that seemed to protect these small white and orange fish.
Amit Lotan incorporated this substance into a sunscreen emulsion and when he returned to Israel in the late 1990s, he founded Nidaria Technology Ltd. to develop the revolutionary Safe Sea sunscreen.