Special Lecture

The increasing power of cryoEM for macromolecular structure determination

PROF. RICHARD HENDERSON

Richard Henderson was the first scientist to successfully produce a three-dimensional image of a biological molecule at atomic resolution using a technique known as cryo-electron microscopy. Henderson’s refinement of imaging methods for cryo-electron microscopy, in which biomolecules are frozen in such a way that allows them to retain their natural shape and are then visualized with a high- resolution microscope, enabled researchers to capture images of numerous biomolecular structures that previously could not be imaged by other means. His later research is focused on single particle electron microscopy and the determination of atomic structures of large noncrystalline protein assemblies. His work on single particles led to new discoveries on structural aspects of biomolecules, the fundamental structures of many of which had long been beyond the reach of traditional microscopy methods. In addition to the Nobel Prize, Henderson received numerous other awards and honours during his career. He was an elected fellow of the Royal Society (1983), a foreign associate of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (1998) and a fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, London (1998). He was a recipient of the Rosenstiel Award for Distinguished Work in Basic Medical Research (1991) and the Copley Medal of the Royal Society (2016).