Graduate Program - Fellowships & Grants - B. R. Baker Award (updated 08/11/04) Professor B.R. Baker was a Professor of Chemistry at UCSB from 1966 until his death in 1971. Baker's graduate work on the structural elucidation and synthesis of Cannabis constituents marked the beginning of a prolific career in the chemistry of natural products. He undertook many diverse projects of medicinal interest including the synthesis of antihemorrhagic vitamin K analogues, biotin derivatives, compounds with hormone activity, sulfones with activity against tuberculosis, and alkaloids. He published two books and more than 370 papers that included a series of papers on the structure and synthesis of the antimalarial alkaloid from Hydrangea that filled an entire issue of the Journal of Organic Chemistry in 1952. He determined the structure of the first known nucleoside antibiotic, puromycin, and synthesized it in 1955. This achievement came long before the discovery of the structure of transfer ribonucleic acid (tRNA). Puromycin was later shown to mimic the structure of tRNA and became and an important tool of research in molecular biology. Puromycin was too toxic for cancer chemotherapy, but it aroused Bill's interest in this field. Few of the myriad of compounds that he had so meticulously synthesized showed any antitumor activity in vivo, so he sought a more rational approach to cancer chemotherapy. Perhaps his greatest contribution to medicinal chemistry was the concept of active-site-directed irreversible enzyme inhibition of substrate-identical enzymes. A monograph summarizing this approach to drug design promptly became on of the classic works in the field. Past lecturers: Year Presenter Institution   Year Presenter Institution 2004 Thomas C. Bruice UCSB   1989 E.J. Corey Harvard 2003 Jack Dixon UCSD   1988 Richard Lerner Scripps Found. 2002 Gregory Petsko Brandeis Univ.   1987 Harry B. Gray Cal Tech 2001 Steven Benner Florida Univ.   1986 Alan R. Fersht Imperial College 2000 Joanne Stubbe MIT   1985 Stephen Benkovic Penn State 1999 Richard E. Dickerson UCLA   1984 Christopher Walsh Harvard Med. 1998 Harold A. Sheraga Cornell Univ.   1982 Daniel Santi UC San Francisco 1997 Daniel E. Koshland Berkeley   1981 Carl Djerassi Stanford Univ. 1996 David S. Sigman UCLA   1980 Linus Pauling 1995 Chi-Huey Wong Scripps Inst.   1979 Bruce N. Ames Berkeley 1994 Richard Holm Harvard Univ.   1978 Jeremy Knowles Harvard Univ. 1993 Olke C. Uhlenbeck Colorado Univ.   1976 Nelson Leonard Illinois Univ. 1992 Peter B. Dervan CAL Tech   1975 Joseph Bertino Yale Univ. 1991 Peter G. Schultz Berkeley   1975 Paul Berg Stanford Univ. Past graduate students receiving the distinguished Baker award. Students receive $500. Year Awardee Group   Year Awardee Group         2001 Patrick Papa Alexander Satz  Lipshutz Bruice  2008 Benjamin Taft Lipshutz   2000 Jennifer Martinez Joe Sclafani Butler Lipshutz 2007 Cody Geary Jaeger   1999 Georgia Carroll Amy Martin Paul Mollard  Little Perona Lipshutz  2006 August Estabrook Yadong Huang Reich Pettus   1998 Amy Allan Helgi Adalsteinsson  John Keith Little Bruice Lipshutz 2005 David Hiller Perona   1997 Angela Belcher Cheryl Bellavia Felice Lightstone  Stucky Wudl Bruice 2004 Dawn Therese Bravo Devleena Mazumder Parsons Bruice   1996 Tim Gross  Gretchen Meister Lipshutz Butler 2003 Jamie Carter Franklin Sun Hur Derek Magdziak Butler T.C. Bruice Pettus   1995 Joseph Leonetti Little 2002 Luke Sherlin Ryan Van de Water Perona Pettus   1994 Ken Browne Kirk Stevens Parsons Lipshutz * resulted in publication(s) acknowledging the Baker Graduate Award

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