Alexander Rich

Alexander Rich, MD (American; born 15 November 1924 in Hartford, Connecticut^[1]) is a biologist and biophysicist. He is the William Thompson Sedgwick Professor of Biophysics at MIT (since 1958) and Harvard Medical School. Dr. Rich earned both an A.B. (magna cum laude) and an M.D. (cum laude) from Harvard University. He was a post-doc of Linus Pauling along with James Watson. He has over 600 publications to his name.

Rich is married to Jane Erving and they have four chilren: Benjamin E., Josiah D., Rebecca B., Jessica J.^[1]

Rich is the founder of Alkermes and has been its director since 1987. Dr. Rich is Co-Chairman of the Board of Directors of Repligen Corporation, a biopharmaceutical company. He is also a member of the Board of Directors for Profectus BioSciences, Inc. He also serves on the editorial board of Genomics and the Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics.

In 1963, Rich discovered polysomes: clusters of ribosomes which read one strand of mRNA simultaneously.^[2]

In 1979, Rich and co-workers at MIT grew a crystal of Z-DNA.^[3] This was the first crystal structure of any form of DNA. After 26 years of attempts, Rich et al. finally crystallised the junction box of B- and Z-DNA. Their results were published in an October 2005 Nature journal.^[4] Whenever Z-DNA forms, there must be two junction boxes that allow the flip back to the canonical B-form of DNA.

List of awards and prizes received

• a member of the National Academy of Sciences (appointed 17 April 1978)^[1]
• a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• a member of the Philosophical Society
• a member of the French Academy of Sciences
• a member of the Institute of Medicine
• a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of U.S. Genomics, Inc.
• President Bill Clinton recognized his outstanding scientific achievements with the National Medal of Science in 1995.
• The Bower Award and Prize for Achievement in Science (2000)
• 2001 William Procter Prize for Scientific Achievement
• 2008 Welch Award in Chemistry: "For outstanding contributions to the understanding of the chemical and biochemical mechanisms in maintaining a living cell".^[5]

Awards and prizes

• Sigma Xi Proctor Prize, Raleigh, NC (2001)
• Bower Award and Prize, the Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, PA (2000)
• National Medal of Science, Washington, DC (1995)
• Linus Pauling Medal, American Chemical Society, Northwest Sections (1995)
• Lewis S. Rosenstiel Award in Basic Biomedical Research, Brandeis Univ., Waltham, MA (1983)
• James R. Killian Faculty Achievement Award, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1980) *Presidential Award, New York Academy of Science, New York, NY (1977)
• Theodore van Karmen Award for Viking Mars Mission, Washington, DC (1976)
• Skylab Achievement Award, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Washington, DC (1974)

Academies

• Foreign Member, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia (1994)
• Honorary Member, Japanese Biochemical Society, Tokyo, Japan (1986)
• Foreign Member, French Academy of Sciences, Paris, France (1984)
• Honorary Doctorate, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (1981)
• American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, PA (1980)
• Pontifical Academy of Sciences (1978)
• National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC (1970)
• Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC (1965)
• Fellow, Guggenheim Foundation (1963)
• Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Boston, MA (1959)
• Fellow, National Research Council, Washington, DC (1949-51).

References

Selected publications

• Brown BA II, Lowenhaupt K, Wilbert CM, Hanlon EB, Rich A (2000). "The Za domain of the editing enzyme dsRNA adenosine deaminase binds left-handed Z-RNA as well as Z-DNA". Proc Nat'l Acad Sci USA 97 (25): 13531–13586. JSTOR 2666404. 
• Kim Y-G, Lowenhaupt K, Maas S, Herbert A, Schwartz T, Rich A (2000). "The Zab domain of the human RNA editing enzyme ADAR1 recognizes Z-DNA when surrounded by B-DNA". J Biol Chem 275 (35): 26828–26833. doi:10.1074/jbc.M003477200. PMID 10843996. 
• Schwartz T, Rould MA, Lowenhaupt K, Herbert A, Rich A (1999). "Crystal structure of the Za domain of the human editing enzyme ADAR1 bound to left-handed Z-DNA". Science 284 (5421): 1841–1845. doi:10.1126/science.284.5421.1841. PMID 10364558. 

External links

• Rich Laboratory website
• Letter from Francis Crick to Alexander Rich (5 December 1974)