Robert Huber was born February 20, 1937 in Munch, Germany. In
1956, he graduated from the Humanistische Karls-Gymnasium. He
began studying chemistry at the Technische Hochschule (later
Technische Universität) in Munch from which he received the Diploma
in Chemistry in 1960. In 1963, he received a Dr. rer. nat researching
the crystal structure of a diazo compound. He continued crystallographic studies at the University and the Physiologisch-Chemisches Institut der
Universität München. |
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In 1971, the University of Basel offered him a chair of
structural biology at the Biozentrum and the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft the
position of a director at the Max-Planck-Institut für Biochemie where he stayed
until 2005. In 2005, he was made Director Emeritus. He also continued with the
Technische Universität München, where he became Professor in 1976.
In 1967, he began crystallographic work on the insect protein
erythrocruorin. The elucidation of this structure and its resemblance to the
mammalian globins as determined by Perutz and Kendrew in their classical
studies suggested for the first time a universal globin fold of the insect metamorphosis hormone ecdysone. In 1970, he started research on the pancreatic
trypsin inhibitor, proteolytic enzymes and their natural inhibitors, proteases, their
proenzymes, and complexes between them. He also studied the structure of
immunoglobulin, the first glycoprotein to be analyzed in atomic detail. He
elucidated the structure and the chemical nature of the selenium moiety in
glutathione peroxidase and the structures of citrate synthase in different states of
ligation and a very large multienzyme complex, heavy riboflavin synthase.
Studies of proteins involved in excitation energy and electron transfer, lightharvesting proteins led to the structure of the reaction center.
For the determination of the three-dimensional structure of a
photosynthetic reaction centre, he shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with
Johann Deisenhofer and Hartmut Michel in 1988. He received the E. K. Frey
Medal from the German Society for Surgery in 1972, the Otto Warburg Medal
from the German Society for Biological Chemistry in 1977, the Emil von Behring
Medal from the University of Marburg in 1982, the Keilin Medal from the London
Biochemical Society and the Richard Kuhn Medal from the Society of German
Chemists, 1987, and the Sir Hans Krebs Medal in 1992. He has also received
numerous honorary doctorates and memberships in foreign chemical and
biochemical societies.
He married Christa Essig in 1960 and they have four children.
Reference:
http://www.bookrags.com/biography/robert-huber-wob/
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