By Kim Gamel, Associated Press, 10/09/02

Excerpts from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarding the 2002 Nobel Prize in chemistry on Wednesday to John B. Fenn, Koichi Tanaka and Kurt Wuethrich for "the development of methods for identification and structure analyses of biological macromolecules." This year's Nobel Prize in chemistry concerns powerful analytical methods for studying biological macromolecules, for example proteins. The possibility of analyzing proteins in detail has led to increased understanding of the processes of life. Researchers can now rapidly and simply reveal what different proteins a sample contains. They can also determine three-dimensional pictures showing what protein molecules look like in solution and can then understand their function in the cell. The methods have revolutionized the development of new pharmaceuticals. Promising applications are also being reported in other areas, for example foodstuff control and early diagnosis of breast cancer and prostate cancer. Mass spectrometry is a very important analytical method used in practically all chemistry laboratories the world over. Previously only fairly small molecules could be identified, but John B. Fenn and Koichi Tanaka have developed methods that make it possible to analyze biological macromolecules as well. The other half of the prize rewards the further development of another favorite method among chemists, nuclear magnetic resonance, NMR. NMR gives information on the three-dimensional structure and dynamics of the molecules. Through his work at the beginning of the 1980s Kurt Wuethrich has made it possible to use NMR on proteins. He developed a general method of systematically assigning certain fixed points in the protein molecule, and also a principle for determining the distances between these. Using the distances, he was able to calculate the three-dimensional structure of the protein. The advantage of NMR is that proteins can be studied in solution, i.e., an environment similar to that in the living cell. The laureates ... have contributed in different ways to the further development of these methods to embrace biological macromolecules. This has meant a revolutionary breakthrough, making chemical biology into the "big science" of our time. Chemists can now rapidly and reliably identify what proteins a sample contains. They can also produce three-dimensional images of protein molecules in solution. Hence scientists can both "see" the proteins and understand how they function in the cells. Recent winners of the Nobel Prize in chemistry: 2002 -- John B. Fenn, United States, Koichi Tanaka, Japan and Kurt Wuethrich, Switzerland, for developing methods used in identifying and analyzing large biological molecules. 2001 -- William S. Knowles and K. Barry Sharpless, United States, and Ryoji Noyori, Japan, for showing how to better control chemical reactions, paving the way for drugs to treat heart ailments and Parkinson's disease. 2000 -- Alan J. Heeger and Alan G. MacDiarmid, United States, and Hideki Shirakawa, Japan, for the discovery that plastic conducts electricity and for the development of conductive polymers. 1999 -- Ahmed H. Zewail, United States, for pioneering investigation of fundamental chemical reactions, using ultra-short laser flashes, on the time scale on which the reactions actually occur. 1998 -- Walter Kohn, United States, for development of density-functional theory in the 1960s that simplifies the mathematical description of the bonding between atoms that make up molecules, and John Pople, Britain, for developing computer techniques to test the chemical structure and details of matter. 1997 -- Paul D. Boyer, United States; John E. Walker, Britain; and Jens C. Skou, Denmark, for their work on how the body's cells store and transfer energy. 1996 -- Harold W. Kroto, Britain, and Robert F. Curl Jr. and Richard E. Smalley, United States, for their discovery of "buckyballs," a type of soccer ball-shaped carbon molecule. 1995 -- Paul Crutzen, the Netherlands, and Mario J. Molina and F. Sherwood Rowland, United States, for their work on the formation and decomposition of the ozone layer. 1994 -- George A. Olah, United States, for his contributions to carbocation chemistry. 1993 -- Kary B. Mullis, United States, and Michael Smith, Canada, for developing two new methods that led to decisive progress in gene technology. 1992 -- Rudolph A. Marcus, United States, for contributions to the theory of electron transfer reactions in chemical systems. 1991 -- Richard R. Ernst, Switzerland, for contributions to the development of the high-resolution nuclear magnetic resonance, or NMR, spectroscopy. 1990 -- Elias James Corey, United States, for developing the theory and methodology of organic synthesis. 1989 -- Thomas Cech and Sidney Altman, United States, for showing independently that RNA, once thought to be merely a genetic messenger, could actively aid chemical reactions. 1988 -- Johann Diesenhofer, Robert Huber and Hartmut Michel, West Germany, for determining the structure of certain proteins needed in photosynthesis. 1987 -- Donald J. Cram and Charles J. Pedersen, United States, and Jean-Marie Lehn, France, for synthesis of molecules that mimic important biological processes. 1986 -- Dudley R. Herschbach and Yuan T. Lee, United States, and John C. Polanyi, Canada, for research showing how basic chemical reactions take place. 1985 -- Herbert A. Hauptman and Jerome Karle, United States, for developing methods to determine the molecular structure of crystals. 1984 -- Robert Bruce Merrifield, United States, for development of methodology for chemical synthesis on a solid matrix. 1983 -- Henry Taube, United States, for work in explaining chemical reaction in everything from photosynthesis in plants to batteries and fuel cells. 1982 -- Aaron Klug, Britain, for work on the structure of genes. 1981 -- Kenichi Fukui, Japan, and Roald Hoffmann, United States, for work in theoretical chemistry in anticipating the course of chemical reactions. 1980 -- Paul Berg, United States, for fundamental studies of the biochemistry of nucleic acids. Walter Gilbert, United States, and Frederick Sanger, Britain, for contributions concerning the base sequences in nucleic acids.

STOCKHOLM, Sweden — American, Japanese and Swiss scientists won the Nobel Prize in chemistry Wednesday for inventing techniques used to identify and analyze proteins, advances that revolutionized the hunt for new medicines.

The techniques are also proving useful for diagnosing some cancers.

John B. Fenn, 85, of Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, and Koichi Tanaka, 43, of Shimadzu Corp. in Kyoto, Japan, will share half of the $1 million prize. The other half of the prize goes to Kurt Wuethrich, 64, a scientist with the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego.

Because of their work, "chemists can now rapidly and reliably identify what proteins a sample contains," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said.

"They can also produce three-dimensional images of protein molecules in solution. Hence, scientists can both 'see' the proteins and understand how they function in the cells."

Fenn and Tanaka produced their breakthroughs in the latter half of the 1980s, transforming an analysis technique called mass spectrometry, which lets scientists rapidly identify a substance. Mass spectrometry is used in tests for doping and illegal drugs, for example.

The technique had been used on small or medium-sized molecules for much of the 20th century. To extend the technique to large molecules, scientists have to make the individual molecules separate and spread out as a cloud in a gas without losing their original structure. Fenn and Tanaka were honored for finding two ways to accomplish that.

"Can you imagine? This happens to so few people," Fenn said when reached at his home in Richmond by The Associated Press. "So many other scientists dream about it. The odds are one in 100,000 or one in a million"

Tanaka, at a news conference in Kyoto, Japan, said the news came as a "total surprise. I still can't believe even now that I would win this kind of a prize."

Wuethrich was honored for improving a technique called nuclear magnetic resonance. The technique allows scientists to develop three-dimensional images of molecules in a solution, which is the natural environment of a protein in a cell.

Wuethrich's work allowed the technique to be used on large molecules like proteins. The first complete protein structure to be determined with his method was achieved in 1985.

Reached in Zurich, Wuethrich said he was "delighted and surprised" at being awarded the prize.

"I am glad that such a prize is coming to Switzerland," he told The Associated Press. "At a time when so much seems to be going wrong, this shows that certain things also have gone right."

The Nobel science awards were to culminate later Wednesday with the announcement of the economics prize, the only award not established in the will of Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite.

The winner of the Nobel Prize in literature was to be named on Thursday in Stockholm and the Nobel Peace Prize was to be announced Friday in Oslo, Norway.

The prizes for medicine and physics were announced earlier this week.

For the second year in a row, the academy decided to award the chemistry and physics honors separately, changing a yearslong practice of announcing them the same day after determining that pairing the awards made it too easy for one to be overlooked.

The medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and peace prizes were first awarded in 1901. The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences was established separately in 1968 by the Swedish central bank, but it is grouped with the other awards.

Nobel Foundation statutes stipulate that no more than three winners can share a prize and the scientific committees often choose the maximum number, finding it hard to single out researchers. Often the awards are given for discoveries made after decades of research.

Nobel gave little guidance other than to say the chemistry prize should go to those who "shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind" and "shall have made the most important chemical discovery or improvement."

The prizes are presented to the winners on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel's death in 1896.