Harold A. Scheraga, one of the world's most eminent and widely published chemists and the George W. and Grace L. Todd Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Cornell University, will be honored by biomolecular researchers from around the world at a symposium on campus, Oct. 25-27, on the occasion of his 80th birthday.

The symposium, "The Role of Protein Structure Prediction in the Post-Genomic Era," will be held in G10 Biotechnology Building, Oct. 25 and 26, and in Baker Lab, Oct. 27, beginning at 8:45 a.m. on all three days. It is free and open to the public.

Scheraga has won numerous awards for his groundbreaking research into protein structure. "I remember most of Harold Scheraga's papers that appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 1967, my first year as a scientist," says Michael Levitt of Stanford University. "Harold's work stood out both for its bold approach and also for the high degree of technical innovation. He inspired me with the confidence to tackle the protein folding problem head-on."

Levitt will present "Protein Folding: A Paradigm for Solving Hard Problems in Biology" during the symposium's Saturday session.

Others participants will cover a wide range of topics, from recent technical advances in nuclear magnetic resonance experiments for use in structural biology and structural genomics to details of a novel approach to computing atomically detailed molecular dynamics. Speakers will include Charles L. Brooks, H. Jane Dyson and Peter E. Wright of Scripps Research Institute; Richard Friesner and Barry Honig of Columbia University; William J. Jorgensen of Yale University; B. Montgomery Pettitt of the University of Houston; Jay W. Ponder of Washington University; and Devarajan Thirumalai of the University of Maryland. Scheraga is widely admired for seeking out the most elegant solutions to complex problems, particularly in his quest to simulate the folding of a protein solely from the physical laws that govern the behavior of its atoms. Recognition over the past half century has included the American Chemical Society Eli Lilly Award and the Kendall, Mobil, Repligen, IBM and Hirschmann awards. He also has received the Nichols, Pauling and Linderstrøm-Lang medals, as well as the Stein and Moore Award of the Protein Society. Scheraga is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. He also has been named a Fulbright Research Scholar and a Fogarty Scholar.

The symposium is organized by the Cornell Theory Center, with support from Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Aventis Pharmaceuticals, Bristol-Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute, GeneFormatics, Johnson and Johnson, Merck Research Laboratories, the National Center for Research Resources, Thermo Finnigan and Universidad Nacional de San Luis, Argentina.