VOLUME 12, NUMBER 19 • APRIL 6, 2001

FRIDAY LECTURE

Schreiber to give the Furlaud Lecture today

Rockefeller University Trustee Stuart L. Schreiber, a professor at Harvard University, will present the Richard M. Furlaud Distinguished Lecture today (April 6). His topic will be "Toward a Chemical Genetics."

Genetics has been a primary contributor to the understanding of biology. Both forward and reverse genetics rely upon mutant alleles to gain insights into pathways or processes of interest. Small molecules have also been used to gain insights into biology in ways that are analogous to either forward or reverse genetics. Many of these advances (for example, Arvid Carlsson’s use of chlorpromazine to explore the dopamine receptor and Gary Borisy’s use of colchicine to discover tubulin) have been brought to light on a case-by-case basis. In his lecture, Schreiber will discuss research aimed at the development of chemical genetics, where small molecules are used in a systematic way to explore biology.

Schreiber is an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and a Morris Loeb Professor at Harvard University, where he is a member of the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and an associate member of the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology. He is also an affiliate of the Department of Cell Biology at the Harvard Medical School, as well as a member of the graduate programs in biophysics at Harvard University and immunology at the Harvard Medical School. He is the founder and director (with Timothy Mitchison) of the Harvard Institute of Chemistry and Cell Biology and the scientific director (with Douglas A. Melton) of the Harvard Center for Genomics and Proteomics. He also is a founder and editor of Chemistry & Biology.

Trustee Stuart Schreiber is a Morris Loeb Professor at Harvard University and an HHMI investigator.

Schreiber received his B.A. from the University of Virginia in 1977, then carried out graduate studies at Harvard University under the supervision of R.B. Woodward and Y. Kishi. After completing his doctoral studies, he joined the faculty at Yale University in 1981. He was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 1984 and to professor in 1986. In 1988 he returned to Harvard, where he has remained since.

Schreiber has received several awards for his work and was elected to both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The Richard M. Furlaud Distinguished Lecture is named in honor of the university’s chairman of the board emeritus. This year’s lecture takes place in Caspary Auditorium at 3:45 p.m. and is preceded by at tea at 3:15 p.m. All are welcome.