Chemistry Nobel Rich in Structure

Abstract

The 2006 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, awarded to Roger Kornberg for the structure and understanding of RNA polymerase (“Solo winner detailed path from DNA to RNA,” R. F. Service, News of the Week, 13 Oct., p. 236) ([1][1]), marks the latest in a long line of Nobel Prizes awarded in the area of macromolecular structure analysis. It is interesting to consider how the selection of Nobel Prizes over the past few decades reflects our fascination with the structure of biomolecules. In particular, there were 12 Nobel Prizes in chemistry and physiology or medicine awarded for work in this field from 1956 to 2006 (table S1) ([2][2]). Almost one in four chemistry prizes since 1956 have been for structure work, and in the last decade, fully half have dealt with work related to macromolecular structure. Because many of these prizes were awarded for fairly recent work, we can compare their subjects to those in the scientific literature as represented in publication databases. We examined the relative abundance of papers dealing with “protein conformation” and its subset, “crystallography,” by measuring the number of records matching these Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) terms in PubMed for each year from 1970 to the present (table S2) ([2][2]). (We assumed that the sum total of PubMed publications bearing the chemistry MeSH term represent the corpus of work eligible for a Chemistry Nobel.) From 1970 to 2006, 4% of all chemistry publications dealt with crystallography, yet this subfield captured 19% of the available Nobel Prizes (table S3) ([2][2]). During the past decade, crystallography papers represented 7% of all chemistry publications, but commanded 4 of 10 available prizes. Even the much broader category of protein conformation displays two-fold “Nobel enrichment” in both year ranges. Overall, the Nobel Prizes in chemistry are noticeably enriched for work in macromolecular structure determination. Macromolecular structure determination is a potent tool to understand biological systems and periodically yields landmark results that impact the scientific community at large. It would also seem that the surest road to Stockholm is through a crystal tray. 1. 1.[↵][3]1. P. Cramer, 2. D. A. Bushnell, 3. R. D. Kornberg , Science 292, 1863 (2001). [OpenUrl][4][Abstract/FREE Full Text][5] 2. 2.[↵][6]See Supporting Online Material available at [www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/315/5808/40/DC1][7]. [1]: #ref-1 [2]: #ref-2 [3]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1. in text [4]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DScience%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1126%252Fscience.1059493%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Apmid%252F11313498%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [5]: /lookup/ijlink/YTozOntzOjQ6InBhdGgiO3M6MTQ6Ii9sb29rdXAvaWpsaW5rIjtzOjU6InF1ZXJ5IjthOjQ6e3M6ODoibGlua1R5cGUiO3M6NDoiQUJTVCI7czoxMToiam91cm5hbENvZGUiO3M6Mzoic2NpIjtzOjU6InJlc2lkIjtzOjEzOiIyOTIvNTUyMy8xODYzIjtzOjQ6ImF0b20iO3M6MjE6Ii9zY2kvMzE1LzU4MDgvNDAuYXRvbSI7fXM6ODoiZnJhZ21lbnQiO3M6MDoiIjt9 [6]: #xref-ref-2-1 View reference 2. in text [7]: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/315/5808/40/DC1