Next fall, undergraduates who sign up for a general chemistry class will be surprised to learn that their professor isn’t any ordinary teacher, but a Nobel Prize laureate.
Tom Cech returned this month to begin his work in CU’s chemistry and biochemistry department as a distinguished professor, Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and director of the Colorado Initiative in Molecular Biotechnology.
Cech won the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1989 for his discovery that RNA in living cells is not only a molecule of heredity but can also function as a catalyst, according to a CU news release.
Leslie Leinwand, MCD biology professor at CU, founded the Colorado Initiative in Molecular Biotechnology and says her collaboration with Cech and the initiative will continue.
“This initiative has been under the able leadership of Leslie Leinwand, and we will continue to work together on energizing the program and bringing together scientists from different fields who normally don’t interact much,” Cech said in a recent press release.
Leinwand says she and Cech will be working on the initiative with the goal of breaking down traditional academic boundaries between the divisions in the science field. The Colorado Initiative in Molecular Biotechnology has recently hired six people.
“Complex science requires complex solutions,” Leinwand said of the initiative’s goals.
Leinwand says she is excited to have Cech back at CU.
“I was thrilled [when I heard of his return],” Leinwand said. “I couldn’t be happier. There is no one I would rather work with. He is a visionary.”
CU’s new Chancellor Philip P. DiStefano expressed his gratitude for Cech’s presence on campus again in a recent press release.
“We couldn’t be happier to have Tom back at the University of Colorado on a full-time basis,” DiStefano said. “His research, teaching and leadership talents will help us move the university forward to an even higher level of excellence.”
Leinwand says students and faculty have responded well to Cech’s return to the staff.
“Tom is one of the most gifted teachers I have ever met in my life,” Leinwand said. “He is inspiring when he teaches. Everyone is thrilled to have him.”
Jayne Aiken, a 19-year-old freshman chemical and biological engineer major, took chemistry this year but said she would have liked to take Cech’s class.
“[Having him as a teacher] would add to the prestige of the class,” Aiken said. “In college it’s all about the professor.”
Contact CU Independent Staff Writer Emily Zarka at Emily.zarka@colorado.edu.
