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Fred Knubel, Director of Public Information
Embargoed:
For Use On May 14, 1996

Columbia's Nakanishi Wins Welch Prize in Chemistry

Koji Nakanishi, Columbia University's renowned natural products chemist who has won more than 30 awards from universities and scientific societies in nine countries, today (Tuesday) was named to receive the 1996 Robert A. Welch Award in Chemistry, among the discipline's highest honors.

The award, which includes $300,000 and a gold medallion, is presented annually by The Welch Foundation, Houston, in recognition of outstanding contributions to chemistry for the betterment of mankind. The selection of Professor Nakanishi, Centennial Professor of Chemistry, was announced at a luncheon held in Faculty House at Columbia. Presentation of the award will take place at the foundation's annual awards banquet in Houston in October.

"Dr. Nakanishi stands as a true giant in the field of organic chemistry," said Richard J.V. Johnson, chairman of The Welch Foundation. "His research into bioactive substances from nature has had a wide range of applications from cancer research to pest management. He has also been a major figure in creating collaborative linkages between Japanese and American scientists."

The foundation cited Professor Nakanishi's lifetime achievements in the field of bioorganic chemistry, which include developing new spectroscopic methods to analyze tiny quantities of natural products and determining the structure of some 180 such bioactive compounds produced by animals, plants, insects and microorganisms, often also suggesting commercial and therapeutic uses for them.

"Dr. Nakanishi's wide-ranging curiosity, voracious appetite for new research challenges and ability to unlock the secrets of the most mysterious bioactive compounds in nature have led to a remarkable slate of achievements," said Dr. Norman Hackerman, chairman of the foundation's Scientific Advisory Board. "By developing general methodologies for the structural determination of difficult-to-study compounds, he has changed the way scientists around the world approach unknown substances."

Professor Nakanishi has worked most recently to understand how biologically active compounds interact with receptors in the body. He is working to develop microscale methods of investigating lipids (oils) as well as to expand techniques for structural determination of carbohydrates and membrane proteins, all substances difficult to study using traditional approaches.

"As our knowledge has expanded, the really challenging problems have become interdisciplinary," Professor Nakanishi said. "After all, nature doesn't operate by academic distinctions. So as we work toward understanding life, there is no end, just more complicated puzzles."

The Welch Award is the latest is a list of honors that have heralded Professor Nakanishi's accomplishments, including the Chemical Society of Japan Award, the Imperial Prize of the Japan Academy, the Arthur C. Cope Award of the American Chemical Society, the Scheele Award of the Swedish Academy of Pharmaceutical Science, the Centenary Medal of the British Chemical Society, the Award in Chemical Sciences from the National Academy of Sciences and the Heyrovsky Honorary Gold Medal from the Czech Academy of Sciences. The Columbia chemist has published more than 650 papers and authored, co-authored or edited nine books, including an autobiography.

Professor Nakanishi earned bachelor's and doctoral degrees from Nagoya University in Japan, conducted postgraduate research at Harvard in 1950-52 and returned to Japan to teach at three prominent universities before joining the Columbia faculty in 1969. He was named Centennial Professor in 1980.

The Robert A. Welch Award in Chemistry has been given since 1972 by The Welch Foundation, one of the oldest and largest sources of private funding for basic chemistry research in the United States. Since its founding in 1954 with a bequest by oilman Robert Alonso Welch, the foundation has awarded more than $300 million in chemistry research grants. Gilbert Stork, Eugene Higgins Professor Emeritus of Chemistry at Columbia, received the award in 1993.

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