Wüthrich, Kurt (1938– )

Swiss structural biologist who was awarded the 2002 Nobel Prize for Chemistry (with US analytical chemist John B Fenn and Japanese engineer Koichi Tanaka) for his development of nuclear magnetic resonance for determining the three-dimensional structure of biological macromolecules in solution.

Wüthrich developed a general method of assigning nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analyses to fixed points on a protein molecule as well as a principle for determining the distances between the points. From this information it was possible to calculate the three-dimensional structure of the molecule. A key advantage of his technique was that the proteins could be studied in solution, an environment similar to a living cell. The discovery has important applications in the study and diagnosis of breast and prostate cancers and the development of pharmaceuticals.

Wüthrich was elected a foreign associate of the US National Academy of Sciences in 1992, and became a visiting professor at the Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, California, in 2001.