The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center

" Everything he touches he leaves a big impact on, " says Rieder. Mitchison is conscious of his shift from describing phenomena to identifying specific proteins that do the work. He is perhaps more keen on the 'how' than the 'what', but says he does " want to get to the level of molecular mechanism. " This is part of the reason for his shift to the ICCB. Once he has a protein, he wants to define its function by switching it on and off at will. " This is the major stumbling block in modern cell biology, " he says. " The high road is biochemical reconstitution [combining all necessary components in a test tube]. For Listeria and actin I think we can do that soon, but mitosis is too complicated at the moment. In the next few years we will probably have to be satisfied with reconstitution of simple sub-processes in mitosis. " Genetics has its limitations, and methods such as antisense are far from perfect; the solution, says Mitchison, is specific chemical inhibitors. The new ICCB will involve approximately equal numbers of chemists and biologists, including Stuart Schreiber, the other co-director, and researchers affiliated with other Harvard and Harvard Medical School faculties. Harvard has provided 10,000 square feet of space, start-up funds, and a new professorship for Mitchison. He will search large libraries of chemicals for inhibitors of both specific proteins and specific cell biological processes. There will be distractions at the start: the unloading of packing cases, the changing of diapers, and perhaps the reconstruction of the " love shack " in the back garden, complete with makeshift hot tub (a bath with a Coleman stove underneath). But, with chemistry at his disposal, Mitchison will be in a position to pull apart mitosis, movement and more. What is it famous for? To put it bluntly, Brown and Goldstein. Michael Brown and Joseph Goldstein shared the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine in 1985 for their discovery of the basic mechanisms of cholesterol metabolism. In fact, UT Southwestern in Dallas has now attracted a plethora of shining lights in biomedicine, but Brown and Goldstein were among the earliest recruits and the first to make it big. When did they move there? Goldstein was a homegrown talent (his down-home accent is well known on the lecture circuit) who returned to his alma mater in 1972. Around the same …