Her father Paul Rudnick was chief chemist for Armour Laboratories, and both of her brothers became physicists.

As a student at Parker High School she won the $2500 grand prize in an essay contest sponsored by the Chicago Daily Tribune.

[5] Rudnick's publications were especially noted for the cell diagrams she hand-drew to explain embryogenesis and other processes.

[7] Her translation work included a 1967 biography of biologist Theodor Boveri, written in German by Fritz Baltzer.

[9] Rudnick lived a somewhat reclusive personal life[10] in a modern house on a hillside in Hamden, Connecticut designed in 1956 by architect King-lui Wu.