NEWS OF THE WEEK
LANGER RECEIVES WOLF PRIZE HONORS: MIT chemical engineer
recognized for work in drug delivery and tissue engineering
R
the David H. Koch Institute Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, received the 2013 Wolf Prize in Chemistry on May 5 in a ceremony at the Knesset in Jerusalem. The award was presented by Israeli President Shimon Peres. The Wolf Prizes, which are sometimes called the Israeli Nobels, are given by the Wolf Foundation, a nonprofit organization in Israel that honors scientists and artists for achievements that benefit humanity. Langer received the $100,000 prize in recognition of his work on polymer systems for drug delivery and tissue engineering. Notably, he invented polyanhydride polymers with tunable degradation properties to controllably release macromolecular drugs over sustained periods of time. These ODED ANTMANN
Langer (left) receives the Wolf Prize from Peres (center).
OBERT S. LANGER, a chemical engineer and
A MAJOR AWARD FOR MASS SPEC PURDUE U
HONORS: Dreyfus Prize given to R. Graham Cooks, who shrank MS devices and expanded the technique
G Cooks
OOD THINGS sometimes come in small pack-
ages. The Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation took that maxim to heart when bestowing its 2013 Dreyfus Prize in the Chemical Sciences on R. Graham Cooks, a pioneer in mass spectrometry, including miniaturized MS instrumentation. The inexpensive miniaturized mass spectrometers devised by Cooks and coworkers at Purdue University, where he is the Henry Bohn Hass Distinguished Professor of Chemistry, are portable handheld devices useful for many applications. But that is just one among several notable developments in MS for which he is honored. Cooks “has enriched analytical chemistry in unparalleled ways,” the foundation notes. “Virtually every pharmaceutical and biotechnology company relies on mass spectrometry at a level that has become possible, in part, through Cooks’s innovations.” CEN.ACS.ORG
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polymers steadily erode in water, releasing macromolecules embedded in them. The erosion rate can be tuned by changing the chemical properties of the polymers. Langer’s first therapeutic success in this area was with Gliadel wafers, which he developed in collaboration with Henry Brem, a neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins University. The wafers are surgically implanted to deliver a drug that treats brain cancer. Langer went on to develop many other polymer systems that release drugs in response to magnetic, ultrasonic, or biological stimuli. In addition to his drug delivery work, Langer “has been the leader in designing bioabsorbable polymers to serve as scaffolds for holding mammalian cells in place during tissue reconstruction,” according to the Wolf Prize committee. Langer’s work in this area in collaboration with Joseph P. Vacanti of Harvard Medical School led to the first approved artificial skin based on synthetic polymers for burn patients. Langer’s work has resulted in more than 800 patents. He has founded or cofounded at least 25 companies to commercialize his research. Langer has received numerous other awards, including the 2006 National Medal of Science. He received the Priestley Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the American Chemical Society, in 2012. The Wolf Prizes, which were established by Germanborn inventor and philanthropist Ricardo Wolf, have been awarded since 1978. In addition to chemistry, prizes are given in agriculture, mathematics, medicine, physics, and the arts.—CELIA ARNAUD
Cooks’s group developed and commercialized handheld MS instruments by shrinking individual components of conventional instruments. The team’s other achievements include important contributions to the development of tandem MS and ambient ionization MS techniques. Tandem MS improves on the structural information available from conventional single-stage MS by fragmenting ions in two stages separated in space or time. The technique is a particularly powerful approach for the study of complex mixtures. Cooks and coworkers also pioneered ambient ionization MS techniques such as desorption electrospray ionization and desorption atmospheric pressure ionization, in which molecular sampling and ionization are concerted, making it possible to analyze samples rapidly in air at room temperature with no sample preparation. Cooks “has invented technology for quick chemical analysis that has applications ranging from medicine to food safety to national security,” says Purdue President Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. “Advances made in his laboratory have not only shaped his field of science but also created tools to keep us safer and to make medical tests easier and treatments more precise.” The biennial Dreyfus Prize consists of $250,000, a citation, and a medal. Cooks will receive the award at a fall ceremony at Purdue.—STU BORMAN
MAY 13, 2013
