LSIPR 50 2018: Kim Nasmyth
Name: Kim Nasmyth
Organisation: University of Oxford
Position: Whitley Professor of Biochemistry
Professor Kim Nasmyth has been awarded the 2018 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, which recognises his work in chromosome segregation. The $3 million prize was given to Nasmyth for his research explaining the mechanism that causes the separation of duplicated chromosomes during cell division; the research has the potential to prevent genetic diseases such as cancer.
Over the course of his career the professor has led research to identify genetic mutations that prevent the division of yeast cells, which has advanced knowledge of how gene activity and cell division are controlled. He was also responsible for co-discovering cohesin, a protein complex that holds sister chromosomes together until they are segregated into daughter cells.
Nasmyth was born in London. He earned his PhD in zoology from the University of Edinburgh, where he worked alongside Nobel Prize winner Paul Nurse on his cell research. Nasmyth completed his postdoctoral studies at the Hall Laboratory at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he commenced his career studying the basic properties of cells and how they regulate fundamental behaviours.
The professor served as director of the newly founded Research Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna before joining the University of Oxford as the head of the Biochemistry department in 2006. As the Whitley Professor of Biochemistry, Nasmyth has the honour of being one of the permanent chairs of the university. He is the sixth person to hold the position.
