Contact Information:
Department of Chemistry
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX 77842
Phone: (979) 845-3243
Fax: (979) 845-5992
scott@mail.chem.tamu.edu

A. I. Scott
Distinguished Professor
Robert A. Welch Chair in Chemistry
D.H.R. Barton Professor of Chemistry
Director, Center for Biological NMR

Ph. D.; D. Sc., Glasgow University

Awards:

• ACS Ernest Guenther Award
• Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award
• Centenary Lecture, Royal Society of Chemistry
• Tetrahedron Prize
• Robert A. Welch Award in Chemistry
• Davy Medal, Royal Society of London
• Queen's Royal Medal, Royal Society of Edinburgh
• Distinguished Texas Scientist of the Year 2002
• ACS Nakanishi Prize 2003

CBI Program

Our current research program has as its goal the development of sensitive NMR methods to observe directly the metabolic sequences in living cells and subcellular bodies, and to discover intermediates of metabolic sequences. Advances have been made in the fields of enzyme mechanism, industrial uses of enzymes, vitamin B₁₂ biosynthesis, antibiotic research, production of anti-tumor drugs and the observation of enzyme-substrate complexes at subzero temperatures. Most recently our research has moved into genetically engineered synthesis of natural products.

Biological nuclear magnetic resonance is a noninvasive technique that allows observation of living cells. Because each nucleus, ¹³C, ¹>H, and ¹⁵N, (even in a large protein molecule) is sensitive to its environment, "chemical shift" can be translated (in one or two dimensions) into the chemical structure of the species present, at any point during a time course experiment, thus revealing the mechanisms of the biochemical reactions taking place, observed directly in the living system or in a pure enzyme. The appropriate substrates and enzymes are isotopically enriched to enhance the NMR signals.

Cloning and expression of the key enzymes of penicillin, cholesterol and vitamin B12 biosynthesis have provided large amounts of these enzymes for NMR studies and site-specific mutagenesis, and molecular biology provides us with a unique opportunity to study molecular events in biology and biochemistry using the most modern instrumentation.

"How Nature Synthesizes Vitamin B₁₂: A Survey of the Last Four Billion Years." A. I. Scott. Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. Engl. 32 (1993) 1223.

"How Nature synthesizes B₁₂ Without Oxygen. Discoveries Along the Ancient, Anaerobic Pathway." A. I. Scott, in "Vitamin B₁₂ and B₁₂-Proteins", B. Kräutler, D. Arigoni, B. T. Golding, Eds., Wiley-VCH, Weinheim, Federal Republic of Germany, 1998, p. 81.

"Engineering Escherichia coli for the Synthesis of Taxadiene, a Key Intermediate in the Biosynthesis of Taxol." Q. Huang, C. A. Roessner, R. Croteau and A. I. Scott. Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry, 9, 2237-2242 (2001).

"Crystal Structure of Precorrin-8x Methyl Mutase." L. W. Shipman, D. Li, C. A. Roessner, A. I. Scott and J. C. Sacchettini. Structure, 9, 587-596 (2001).

"Isolation and characterization of 14 additional genes specifying the anaerobic biosynthesis of cobalamin (vitamin B₁₂) in Propionibacterium freudenreichii (P. shermanii)." C. A. Roessner, K-x Huang, M. J. Warren, E. Raux and A. I. Scott. Microbiology, 148, 1845-1853 (2002).