A Kentucky native who won the Nobel Prize for research that advanced the understanding of gene structure, Phillip A. Sharp, Ph.D., will visit UofL on May 25. His presentation is titled, “40 years from split genes to convergence of life sciences with engineering and physical sciences.”

Sharp shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Richard Roberts, Ph.D., for 1977 research that revealed the first indications of “discontinuous genes” in mammalian cells. The discovery fundamentally changed scientists’ understanding of gene structure.

Sharp is an institute professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Department of Biology. His research centers on the molecular biology of gene expression relevant to cancer and the mechanisms of RNA splicing. The author of more than 400 publications, Sharp is a member of the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society and the Royal Society, United Kingdom. The Kentucky native earned his B.A. in chemistry and mathematics from Union College in Barbourville, Ky.

The lecture begins at noon, Thursday, May 25, at the Kosair Charities Clinical and Translational Research Building, room 101-102. The event, hosted by the Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Genetics of the UofL School of Medicine, is part of the Austin and Mary Frances Bloch Lecture Series, established in 1999 in honor of Austin Bloch and his wife, Mary Frances Bloch. Austin Bloch practiced medicine in Louisville for many years and served as an adjunct clinical instructor for the UofL School of Medicine. 

Sharp also will present a research seminar on Friday, May 26 in room 102 of the UofL School of Medicine instructional building on the topic, “Super-enhancer-associated microRNAs and phase transitions.”

Sharp is the second Nobel laureate to visit UofL this month. Peter Agre, M.D., spoke on Belknap Campus on May 8. Agre shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 2003, with Roderick MacKinnon for his work in the discovery of water channels in cell membranes. 

Kosair Charities Clinical and Translational Research Building is located at 505 S. Hancock St., Louisville, Ky. 40202.

Photo © Peter Badge / Typos1 in coop. Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings—all rights reserved, 2016

May 17, 2017