Carolyn Bertozzi

Carolyn Bertozzi is an American chemist and Nobel laureate recognized for her contributions to the fields of chemical biology and bioorthogonal chemistry. Bertozzi coined the term "bioorthogonal chemistry" to describe chemical reactions that can occur inside living systems without interfering with native biological processes. She earned a Bachelor of Arts in chemistry from Harvard University and a doctorate in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, where she focused on the chemical synthesis of oligosaccharide analogs. Following postdoctoral research in cellular immunology at the University of California, San Francisco, Bertozzi joined the University of California, Berkeley faculty, concentrating on disease-associated glycobiology and the development of therapeutic modalities targeting these pathways.

Bertozzi pioneered the use of click chemistry in living organisms, developing bioorthogonal reactions that enable scientists to study cells, track biological processes, and improve the targeting of cancer pharmaceuticals. By eliminating the need for a copper catalyst, she enabled chemical reactions to be performed safely within living systems. Her laboratory has applied these methods to investigate the role of sugars in biology, develop diagnostic tests for infectious diseases, and create biological pharmaceuticals with enhanced tumor-targeting capabilities. Bertozzi's research has also led to the development of next-generation antibody-drug conjugates, lysosome-targeting chimeras (LYTACs), antibody-enzyme conjugates, and antibody-lectin chimeras, several of which have advanced to clinical evaluation for cancer and autoimmune diseases.

Bertozzi received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, jointly with Morten P. Meldal and Karl Barry Sharpless, for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry. She is the eighth woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Her honors include the Lemelson-MIT Award for inventors, the Ernst Schering Prize, a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, the ACS Award in Pure Chemistry, the ACS Priestley Award, and the American Association for Cancer Research Award. Bertozzi is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, National Academy of Engineering, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina.

At Stanford University, Bertozzi holds the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professorship in the School of Humanities and Sciences and serves as an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She is the former director of the Molecular Foundry at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Bertozzi has founded multiple biotechnology companies to translate her research in chemical biology and glycobiology into clinical applications. Her work includes the synthesis of chemical tools to study cell surface glycans and their roles in diseases such as cancer, inflammation, and viral infections. Bertozzi has mentored more than 250 undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows, and has received multiple teaching awards for her contributions to science education.