Robert G. Roeder is an American biochemist. He is known as a pioneer scientist in eukaryotic transcription. He discovered three distinct nuclear RNA polymerases in 1969 and characterized many proteins involved in the regulation of transcription, including basic transcription factors and the first mammalian gene-specific activator over five decades of research. He is the recipient of the Gairdner Foundation International Award in 2000, the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research in 2003, and the Kyoto Prize in 2021. He currently serves as Arnold and Mabel Beckman Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Biochemical and Molecular Biology at The Rockefeller University.
Marlene Belfort is an American biochemist known for her research on the factors that interrupt genes and proteins. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been admitted to the United States National Academy of Sciences.
Roger David Kornberg is an American biochemist and professor of structural biology at Stanford University School of Medicine. Kornberg was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2006 for his studies of the process by which genetic information from DNA is copied to RNA, "the molecular basis of eukaryotic transcription."
Importin alpha, or karyopherin alpha refers to a class of adaptor proteins that are involved in the import of proteins into the cell nucleus. They are a sub-family of karyopherin proteins.
Christopher Boyce Burge is Professor of Biology and Biological Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Ronald R. Breaker is an American biochemist who is a Sterling Professor of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology at Yale University. He is best known for the discovery of riboswitches. His current research is focused on understanding advanced functions of nucleic acids, including the discovery and analysis of riboswitches and ribozymes.
Mary Jane Osborn was an American biochemist and microbiologist known for her research on the biosynthesis of lipopolysaccharide, a key component of the outer membrane of Gram-negative bacteria, and discovering the mechanism of action of the anti-cancer drug methotrexate. She headed the Department of Molecular Biology and Biophysics at the University of Connecticut Health Center and served as president of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.
Judith P. Klinman is an American chemist, biochemist, and molecular biologist known for her work on enzyme catalysis. She became the first female professor in the physical sciences at the University of California, Berkeley in 1978, where she is now Professor of the Graduate School and Chancellor's Professor. In 2012, she was awarded the National Medal of Science by President Barack Obama. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Philosophical Society.
Susan Gottesman is a microbiologist at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), which is part of the National Institutes of Health. Gottesman has been the editor of the Annual Review of Microbiology since 2008.
Kathleen Matthews is an American biochemist specializing in DNA/protein interactions, specifically related to the lac repressor. She is the Stewart Memorial Professor Emerita of BioSciences at Rice University.
Marion Sewer (1972-2016) was a pharmacologist and professor at the University of California, San Diego's Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences known for her research on steroid hormone biogenesis and her commitment to increasing diversity in science. Much of her research centered around cytochrome P450, a family of enzymes involved in the conversion of cholesterol into steroid hormones. She died unexpectedly at the age of 43 from a pulmonary embolism on January 28, 2016, while traveling through the Detroit airport.
Clara Cynthia Benson (1875–1964) was a Canadian chemist, the sole female founder of the American Society for Biological Chemistry and one of the first two women to earn a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. She later became one of U of T's first two female associate professors. Trained in physical chemistry, she switched focus to biochemistry when lack of job opportunities for female chemists led her to take a position teaching food chemistry as part of U of T's Domestic Science program. She also played a large role in the development of U of T's women's athletics program.
Anna Marie Pyle is an American academic who is a Sterling Professor of Molecular, Cellular & Developmental Biology and a Professor of Chemistry at Yale University. and an Investigator for Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Pyle is the president of the RNA Society, the vice-chair of the Science and Technology Steering Committee at Brookhaven National Laboratory, and previously she served as chair of the Macromolecular Structure and Function A Study Section at the National Institutes of Health.
Kim Orth is a microbiologist and biochemist. She is the Earl A. Forsythe chair in biomedical science and professor of molecular biology and biochemistry at UT Southwestern. She is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. Her research focuses on bacterial pathogenesis.
Rebecca W. Heald is an American professor of cell and developmental biology. She is currently a Professor in the Department of Molecular & Cell Biology at the University of California, Berkeley. In May 2019, she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. She has published over 120 research articles in peer reviewed journals.
Alexandra C. Newton is a Canadian and American biochemist. She is a Distinguished Professor of pharmacology at the University of California, San Diego. Newton runs a multidisciplinary Protein kinase C and Cell signaling biochemistry and cell biology research group in the School of Medicine, investigating molecular mechanisms of signal transduction in the Phospholipase C (PLC) and Phosphoinositide 3-kinase signaling pathways. She has been continuously funded by the US National Institutes of Health since 1988.
Karin Musier-Forsyth, an American biochemist, is an Ohio Eminent Scholar on the faculty of the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry at Ohio State University. Musier-Forsyth's research involves biochemical, biophysical and cell-based approaches to understand the interactions of proteins and RNAs involved in protein synthesis and viral replication, especially in HIV.
Anita Hopper is an American molecular geneticist who is a professor at the Ohio State University. She studies the mechanisms of distribution of RNA between the nucleus and cytoplasm. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and the American Association for the Advancement of Science and was elected a Member of the National Academy of Sciences in 2021.
Suzanne Ruth Pfeffer is an American neuroscientist who is a professor at Stanford University. Her research investigates the molecular mechanisms that cause receptors to be transported between membrane compartments in cells, and she is an expert in Rab GTPases and the molecular basis of inherited Parkinson's disease. She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Society for Cell Biology.
Susan J. Baserga is an American physician who is the William H. Fleming Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University. Her research considers the molecular basis of ribosomes, and the mechanistic basis of inherited human disease.
