Efficient way to filter this string

Hello, I have an email string that sometimes has a name and the email address between <> and sometimes has the email adress right away. Two examples of the possible value of $address Joe Doe <joe.doe@somedomain.com> jamie.doe@somedomain.com I need to convert this string always to the email address and discard the name to the left of the < character, if the string is already correct (like jamie.doe@somedomain.com) then do not change it, keep it as it is. I have writen a function to do a for loop and check for the < then copy everything to the end removing the >. I wonder, is there a more efficient, clear way to accomplish this? Thanks in advace.