Springe direkt zu Inhalt

Recognition for Outstanding Achievements in Life Sciences

Honorary Doctorate for Chemist Carolyn Bertozzi – Award Ceremony on October 22, 2014

№ 360/2014 from Oct 20, 2014

One of the most distinguished chemists of the present day, Professor Carolyn R. Bertozzi from the University of California at Berkeley, will be granted an honorary doctorate from Freie Universität Berlin on Wednesday, October 22, 2014. With this degree, the Department of Biology, Chemistry, and Pharmacy of Freie Universität is recognizing Bertozzi's achievements in the life sciences. She introduced highly selective, so-called bioorthogonal reactions, for manipulating and probing biomolecules in living cells and organisms. Using these revolutionary methods, her research group studies disease-related mechanisms in glycobiology that result in changes of cell surface glycosylation patterns in cancer, inflammation and bacterial infections, as well as new diagnostic and therapeutic approaches. Both the ceremony and Bertozzi's lecture, to be given in English, are public. The lecture title is "Bringing Chemistry to Life." There is no charge for admission.

Carolyn R. Bertozzi graduated from Harvard University with a bachelor's degree and then went on to the University of California in Berkeley, where she received her doctorate in 1993. Currently, Bertozzi is the T.Z. and Irmgard Chu Distinguished Professor of Chemistry and also a professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of California in Berkeley.

Bertozzi has received numerous awards, including the MacArthur Foundation Award (1999), the ACS Award in Pure Chemistry (2001), the Irving Sigal Young Investigator Award of the Protein Society (2002), the Ernst Schering Preis (2007), the Lemelson-MIT Prize (2010), and the Tetrahedron Young Investigator Award for Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry (2011). She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences (USA), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the German National Academy of Sciences, Leopoldina.

Time and Location

  • Wednesday, October 22, 2014, 4.p.m.
  • Henry Ford Building, Lecture Hall A, Freie Universität Berlin, Garystraße 35, 14195 Berlin; subway station: Thielplatz (U3)

Further Information

Katharina Tebel, Office Manager, Collaborative Research Center 765 (SFB 765) “Multivalency as Chemical Organizational and Operational Principle: New Architectures, Functions, and Applications,” Freie Universität Berlin, Tel.: +49 30 838-53547, Email: office@sfb765.de