Morten P. Meldal

Morten Meldal
Meldal in 2023
Born
Morten Peter Meldal

(1954-01-16) 16 January 1954 (age 70)
Denmark
EducationTechnical University of Denmark (BS, MS, PhD)
AwardsNobel Prize in Chemistry (2022)
Scientific career
FieldsOrganic chemistry
Institutions
Thesis Reactions of Unsaturated Sugars with Hydrogen Halides  (1983)
Doctoral advisorKlaus Bock

Morten Peter Meldal (born 16 January 1954) is a Danish chemist and Nobel laureate. He is a professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen[1] in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is best known for developing the CuAAC-click reaction,[2][3] concurrently with but independent of Valery V. Fokin and K. Barry Sharpless.[4]

Biography

Meldal received B.S. and PhD degrees in chemical engineering from Technical University of Denmark (DTU); his PhD work was supervised by Klaus Bock and focused on the synthetic chemistry of carbohydrates.[5] From 1983 to 1988 he was a postdoctoral fellow in organic chemistry, first at the DTU, next at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology at Cambridge University[6] and then at the University of Copenhagen.[7] In 1996 he was appointed assistant professor at DTU. Since 1998 he has led the synthesis group in the Department of Chemistry of the Carlsberg Laboratory.[8]

Meldal developed several technological techniques and instruments for peptide synthesis near the start of his career. He developed the multiple-column synthesis used in peptide and organic synthesis instruments, as well as for assembling large split-mix libraries. He first presented the cycloaddition of acetylenes and azides used in peptide and protein conjugations, in polymers and in material sciences. Meldal's group has then showed this reaction to be orthogonal to the majority of functional group chemistries.[9]

More recently Meldal has developed an optical encoding technique[10] and has focused on the merger of organic chemistry and peptide chemistry on solid support. He has devised a range of novel methods for the generation of N-acyl iminium ions in which combinatorial libraries of these compounds are generated and screened for substances with activity toward G protein-coupled receptors in cell-based on-bead screening.[11]

In 2019, Meldal co-founded the company Betamab Therapeutics ApS, based on the concept of beta-bodies, i.e. peptide mimics of antibodies.[12] The company closed in 2021.[13]

Honors and awards

Meldal was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, jointly with Carolyn R. Bertozzi and Karl Barry Sharpless, "for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry".[14]

References

  1. ^ "Morten Meldal is the new professor in nanochemistry". Nano- Science Center. 7 February 2011. Archived from the original on 16 August 2011. Retrieved 4 April 2014.
  2. ^ Tornøe, C.W. and Meldal, M., Peptidotriazoles: Copper(I)-catalyzed 1,3-dipolar cycloadditions on solid-phase. In: Lebl, M., Houghten, R.A. (Eds.), American Peptide Society and Kluwer Academic Publishers, San Diego, 2001, pp. 263–4.
  3. ^ Yan, Bing; Czarnik, Anthony W., eds. (4 December 2001). "five". Optimization of Solid-Phase Combinatorial Synthesis (1 ed.). United States: CRC Press. p. 408. ISBN 978-0-8247-0654-8. Archived from the original on 5 October 2022. Retrieved 5 April 2014. and Meldal, M., Peptidotriazoles on solid-phase.
  4. ^ Rostovtsev, Vsevolod V.; Green, Luke G; Fokin, Valery V.; Sharpless, K. Barry (2002). "A Stepwise Huisgen Cycloaddition Process: Copper(I)-Catalyzed Regioselective "Ligation" of Azides and Terminal Alkynes". Angewandte Chemie International Edition. 41 (14): 2596–2599. doi:10.1002/1521-3773(20020715)41:14<2596::aid-anie2596>3.0.co;2-4. PMID 12203546.
  5. ^ "2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry awarded to Morten Meldal". The European Peptide Society. 8 October 2022. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 12 October 2022.
  6. ^ "LMB Alumni". MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology. Archived from the original on 1 August 2019. Retrieved 4 April 2014.
  7. ^ "Morten Peter Meldal". 27 August 2007. Archived from the original on 12 October 2022. Retrieved 12 October 2022.
  8. ^ Rademann, Jorg (29 May 1999). "SPOCC: A Resin for Solid-Phase Organic Chemistry and Enzymatic Reactions on Solid Phase". Journal of the American Chemical Society. 23 (121): 5459–5466. doi:10.1021/ja984355i.
  9. ^ Steinhagen, Max; Holland-Nell, Kai; Meldal, Morten; Beck-Sickinger, Annette G. (2011). "Simultaneous 'One Pot' Expressed Protein Ligation and CuI-Catalyzed Azide/Alkyne Cycloaddition for Protein Immobilization". ChemBioChem. 12 (16): 2426–2430. doi:10.1002/cbic.201100434. PMID 21901810. S2CID 44986511.
  10. ^ Hu, Hongxia; Nikitin, Sergei; Berthelsen, Adam Bjørnholdt; Diness, Frederik; Schoffelen, Sanne; Meldal, Morten (2018). "Sustainable Flow Synthesis of Encoded Beads for Combinatorial Chemistry and Chemical Biology". ACS Comb. Sci. 20 (8): 492–498. doi:10.1021/acscombsci.8b00052. PMID 29969235. S2CID 206543696.
  11. ^ Diness, Frederik; Beyer, Jürgen; Meldal, Morten (2006). "Solid-Phase Synthesis of Tetrahydro-β-carbolines and Tetrahydroisoquinolines by Stereoselective Intramolecular N-Carbamyliminium Pictet–Spengler Reactions". Chemistry – A European Journal. 12 (31): 8056–8066. doi:10.1002/chem.200600138. PMID 16881029.
  12. ^ Hu, Hongxia; Kofoed, Christian; Li, Ming; Gonçalves, Juliana P.L.; Hansen, Jonas; Wolfram, Martin; Hansen, Axel K.; Hartmann, Camilla H.F.; Diness, Frederik; Schoffelen, Sanne; Meldal, Morten (2019). "Computational Evolution of Threonine-Rich β-Hairpin Peptides Mimicking Specificity and Affinity of Antibodies". ACS Central Science. 5 (2): 259–269. doi:10.1021/acscentsci.8b00614. PMC 6396188. PMID 30834314.
  13. ^ "Betamab ApS". Paqle. Archived from the original on 10 December 2021. Retrieved 10 December 2021.
  14. ^ "Press release: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2022" (Press release). Nobel Foundation. 5 October 2022. Archived from the original on 5 October 2022. Retrieved 5 October 2022.
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