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Media call on expert professor after Nobel Prize winners announced

Chemistry Professor Marc Zimmer poses with mice that have been genetically modified with Green Fluorescent Protein.

October 09, 2008

Few know more about Green Fluorescent Protein, a protein that makes some jellyfish and other organisms glow, than Chemistry Professor Marc Zimmer - he literally wrote the book on it. So when the 2008 Nobel Prize for Chemistry went to Japan´s Osamu Shimomura and Americans Martin Chalfie and Roger Tsien, three scientists who have dedicated their lives to the study of the glowing protein, Zimmer was one of the most excited - and least surprised.

"I had a feeling these scientists might win," Zimmer said. "I had an opinion piece ready and was just waiting for the early morning announcement."

Zimmer was also ready to answer media inquiries - a good thing, since the first, from a reporter with Nature magazine, came at 6:42 a.m., less than an hour after the official announcement. Zimmer was quoted in a number of articles, including the San Diego Union Tribune, Science, Science News, Wired and Physics Today.

The Los Angeles Times published Zimmer´s opinion piece, which explained the importance of GFP and how science has been revolutionized by a seemingly insignificant curiosity with jellyfish. To see Zimmer´s article, click here.

Additionally, the official press release from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which selects the Nobel Prize winners, includes a link to Zimmer´s GFP website GFP website. The site, which normally gets about 500 hits a day, had 30,000 by 3 p.m. on the day of the announcement, Zimmer said.

A computational chemist, Zimmer himself studies Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP), using computer technology to look for new and different uses. In 2005, he published the first popular science book about GFP, "Glowing Genes: A Revolution in Biotechnology," which presented an overview of how these glowing proteins can be attached to other proteins within a cell, making the formerly invisible protein "glow." This discovery, Zimmer says, has revolutionized everything from cancer research to cloning to neuroscience.

Through his research, his website and his writing, Zimmer has brought GFP into the spotlight, highlighting what he calls "the microscope of the 21st century." The Nobel Prize, he says, will only help to bring more attention to its vast potential.

"The Nobel Prize has recognized an important and fascinating area of research," Zimmer said. "I hope the amazing images and intrigue of the field excites many teachers and their students and draws them into chemistry."

Marc Zimmer, the Barbara Zaccheo Kohn ´72 Professor of Chemistry and chair of the chemistry department, joined the Connecticut College faculty in 1990. In addition to "Glowing Genes," Zimmer has published more than 50 research papers, as well as numerous opinion pieces and articles in publications such as the Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, Chemical and Engineering News and Hartford Courant. This year, Zimmer is leading the first class of 17 Science Leaders, a group of students participating in a four-year program that provides them with financial aid and close mentoring and encourages women and minorities to pursue degrees in science.

For more information contact: Amy Martin (860) 439-2526; a.martin@conncoll.edu