Title of Lecture: Multifunctional Radical Quenchers as Mitochondrial Therapeutic Agents
Speaker: Sidney Hecht
Time: Tuesday, July 9, 2013. 10:00AM
Place: No. 101 Lecture Hall, the Second Chmistry Building, LZU
Introduction to the speaker:
Prof. Sidney Hecht obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the University of Illinois. Following studies as an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow in Molecular Biology at the University of Wisconsin, he was a member of the MIT Chemistry faculty from 1971-79. He was the John W. Mallet Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Biology at University of Virginia from 1978-2008. From 1981-87 he held concurrent appointments at Smith Kline & French Laboratories, first as Vice President Preclinical R&D, then as Vice President Chemical R&D. Since 2008 he has been Director of the Center for BioEnergetics in the Biodesign Institute, and Professor of Chemistry at Arizona State University. He has been an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow, and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow. Prof. Hecht received the 1996 Cope Scholar Award of the ACS and was selected as Virginia’s Outstanding Scientist for 1996. He received the 1998 Research Achievement Award of the American Society of Pharmacognosy and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and of the American Society of Pharmacognosy. He received the ASU Faculty Achievement Award in Defining Edge Research: Innovation (2011). He has been an Associate Editor of the Journal of the American Chemical Society since 1992.
His research interests include the synthesis and mechanism of action of bleomycin group antitumor agents. He identified DNA topoisomerase I as the locus of action of the alkaloid camptothecin and participated in the discovery and development of the camptothecin analogue topotecan, marketed under the trade name Hycamtin for the treatment of ovarian cancer and small cell lung cancer. At ASU, his Center is studying the chemistry of the mitochondrial electron transport chain with the goal of devising therapeutic strategies to treat mitochondrial diseases. Other research interests include the elaboration and study of proteins containing synthetic amino acids. He has published more than 400 research papers and has supervised more than 250 graduate students and postdoctoral associates.
