Don Craig Wiley

Don Craig Wiley (October 21, 1944 – November 2001)[1] was an American microbiologist.

Wiley was world-renowned for finding new ways to help the human immune system battle such viral scourges as smallpox, influenza, AIDS, Ebola, and herpes simplex. His research was honored with the 1993 Cancer Research Institute William B. Coley Award. Harvard called Wiley "one of the most influential biologists of his generation." In 1999, Wiley and another Harvard professor, Dr. Jack Strominger, won the Japan Prize for their discoveries of how the immune system protects humans from infections.[2]

Wiley received his doctoral degree in biophysics in 1971 from Harvard University where he worked under direction of subsequent 1976 chemistry Nobel Prize winner William N. Lipscomb, Jr. [3] There, Wiley did early work on the structure of aspartate carbamoyltransferase, [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] the largest molecular structure determined at that time. Noteworthy in this effort is that Wiley managed to grow crystals of aspartate carbamoyltransferase suitable for doing its x-ray structure, a particularly difficult task in the case of this molecular complex.

Famous quote: "I'm sorry, but I just don't understand anything in biology unless I know what it looks like."

Wiley owned a British racing green-colored Aston Martin.

Don Wiley disappeared on November 15, 2001; his body was found in the Mississippi River a month later and his death was ruled to be an accident.[12][13]

References

  1. ^ [1]
  2. ^ [2]
  3. ^ [3]
  4. ^ Steitz, T. A., Wiley, D. C., and Lipscomb, W. N., The Structure of Aspartate Transcarbamylase. I. A Molecular Two Fold Axis in the Complex with Cytidine Triphosphate," Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 58, 1859-1861 (1967).
  5. ^ Wiley, D. C. and Lipscomb, W. N., "Crystallographic determination of symmetry of aspartate transcarbamylase: Studies of trigonal and tetragonal crystalline forms of aspartate transcarbamylase show that the molecule has a three-fold and a two-fold symmetry axis," Nature 218, 1119-1121 (1968).
  6. ^ Wiley, D. C., Evans, D. R., Warren, S. G., McMurray, C. H., Edwards, B. F. P., Franks, W. A., and Lipscomb, W. N., "The 5.5 A Resolution Structure of the Regulatory Enzyme, Aspartate Transcarbamylase," Cold Spring Harbor Symposium 36, 285-290 (1971).
  7. ^ Evans, D. R., Warren, S. G., Edwards, B. F. P., McMurray, C. H., Bethge, P. H., Wiley, D. C., and Lipscomb, W. N., "The Aqueous Central Cavity in Aspartate Transcarbamylase from E. coli," Science 179, 683 (1973).
  8. ^ Warren, S. G., Edwards, B. F. P., Evans, D. R., Wiley, D. C., and Lipscomb, W. N., "Aspartate Transcarbamoylase from E. coli. Electron Density at 5.5 A Resolution," Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA 70, 1117-1121 (1973).
  9. ^ Edwards, B. F. P., Evans, D. R., Warren, S. G., Monaco, H. L., Landfear, S. M., Eisele, G., Crawford, J. L., Wiley, D. C., and Lipscomb, W. N., "Complex of Aspartate Transcarbamoylase from Escherichia coli with its Allosteric Inhibitor, Cytidine Triphosphate: Electron Density at 5.5 A Resolution," Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 71, 4437 (1974).
  10. ^ Lipscomb, W. N., Evans, D. R., Edwards, B. F. P., Warren, S. G., Pastra-Landis, S. C., and Wiley, D. C., "Three-Dimensional Structures at 5.5 A Resolution and Regulatory Processes in Aspartate Transcarbamylase from E. coli," J. Supramolecular Structure 2, 82-99 (1974).
  11. ^ Honzatko, R. B., Crawford, J. L., Monaco, H. L., Ladner, J. E., Edwards, B. F. P., Evans, D. R., Warren, S. G., Wiley, D. C., Ladner, R. C., and Lipscomb, W. N., "Crystal and molecular structures of native and CTP-liganded aspartate carbamoyltransferase from Escherichia coli," J. Mol. Biol. 160, 219-263 (1983).
  12. ^ [4]
  13. ^ [5]

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