Pioneer of Supramolecular Chemistry, Julius Rebek Jr., at Freie Universität Berlin
American Researcher in Berlin-Dahlem as Humboldt Research Fellow
№ 161/2009 from Jun 19, 2009
The renowned American chemist, Professor Julius Rebek, has been awarded a Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. The award is endowed with 60,000 euros. Rebek is a world-renowned pioneer of supramolecular chemistry. To approach the question of how life could have originated, he developed synthetic molecules that reproduce themselves in a test tube. Today, his main field of research is the production of nanometer-sized molecules having the shape of tennis balls that can open and close and absorb smaller molecules in their cavities. One objective of this research is the targeted release of encapsulated drugs directly to the diseased cells.
Julius Rebek was born in Hungary in 1944. He completed his Ph.D. in 1970 at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston. From 1970 to 1976 he was an assistant professor at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), and from 1976 to 1979 an associate professor at the University of Pittsburgh. Once tenured, he taught and carried out research there until 1989, when he joined the MIT faculty. Since 1996 he has been the director of the Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology at Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, one of the world's leading research institutions for chemistry and biochemistry.
Rebek was nominated for this research award jointly with the chemists, Prof. Dr. Christoph Schalley of Freie Universität, and Prof. Dr. Thomas Carell of LMU Munich. During the next year Rebek will be at Freie Universität Berlin several times for research purposes.
Further Information
For further Information and/or interview requests, please contact:
- Prof. Dr. Christoph A. Schalley, Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Freie Universität Berlin, Tel.: +49 (0)30/838-52639, Email: schalley@chemie.fu-berlin.de