James Spudich | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1942-01-07)7 January 1942 (age 83) |
| Alma mater | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,Stanford University, MRCLaboratory of Molecular Biology |
| Known for | Molecular motors |
| Awards | E. B. Wilson Medal(2011) Albert Lasker Award(2012) Wiley Prize in Biomedical Science(2012) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Biochemistry,Biophysics |
| Institutions | Stanford University |
| Doctoral advisor | Arthur Kornberg |
| Other academic advisors | John Woodland Hastings,Hugh Huxley |
| Doctoral students | Coleen T. Murphy |
James A. Spudich (/ˈspʊdɪtʃ/[1]) is an American scientist and professor. He is the Douglass M. and Nola Leishman Professor of Biochemistry and of Cardiovascular Disease atStanford University and works on the molecular basis of muscle contraction. He was awarded theAlbert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award in 2012 withMichael Sheetz andRonald Vale. He is a Fellow of theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Member of theNational Academy of Sciences.
He was born inBenld,Illinois of Croatian ancestry.[2] He earned hisB.S. in chemistry fromUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he worked inJohn Woodland Hastings's lab on the topic ofbioluminescence, and helped Hastings teach in the physiology course at theMarine Biological Laboratory atWoods Hole. He earned his Ph.D. inbiochemistry from Stanford University under the guidance fromArthur Kornberg. He later did hispostdoctoral research at Stanford University withCharles Yanofsky and at MRC in theLaboratory of Molecular Biology withHugh Huxley.[3]
His research is focused on studyingmolecular motors particularlymyosin. With Huxley, he started working on an actin/myosin/ATP model for molecular motors,[4][5] proposing that myosin would ratchetactin and exert a stroke.[6] Spudich first attempted to create anin vitro setup with actin and myosin. However, he faced great difficulty aligning actin filaments.[3] In 1982 he andMichael Sheetz started to work on the algaNitella, which has long oriented actin fibers, and observed myosin coated beads moving alongactin filaments.[7] This provided strong clues about the molecular transport of intracellular cargo, later refined to observing a single step of a single myosin molecule.[8] His research and its place in the overall development of the motility field has been described in a number of well-cited review articles.[9][10][11]
He started atUCSF and then came to Stanford as a professor ofStructural biology in 1977. In 1992 he switched to the Department ofBiochemistry. In the late 1990s, he joined with Stanford physicistSteven Chu to create an interdisciplinary research program that combines engineering, physics, and biology — launching theStanford University Bio-X Initiative and physically locates investigators from these distinct disciples together for extended periods.[12] They pitched the concept to Stanford ProvostCondoleezza Rice.[13] From 1994–1998 he was the editor of theAnnual Review of Cell and Developmental Biology.[14]
In 1998 Spudich co-foundedCytokinetics Inc. in San Francisco, along with Ron Vale and James Sabry fromUCSF and Larry Goldstein fromUCSD.[15] Spudich also co-founded MyoKardia in 2012 which was acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb in 2020 for $13.1 billion. In 2019, James Spudich, Annamma Spudich, Darshan Trivedi, Suman Nag and Kathleen Ruppel co-founded Kainomyx Inc. which is focused on treating neglected tropical diseases. He was the president of theAmerican Society for Cell Biology in 1989.
He met his wife Annamma ("Anna") when they were both at the Marine Biology Lab with Hastings. They have two daughters, and five grandchildren.[12] Spudich's long-time recreational hobby is flying small planes.[13]
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