The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced October 9 that John Fenn of the United States, Koichi Tanaka of Japan and Kurt Wuethrich of Switzerland won the 2002 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for advances in the analytical chemistry of large biological molecules that will have have huge societal impact and may lead to the understanding the processes of life itself. Winners will share the $1 million prize.

"Their work has paved the way for the future finding of a cure for cancer," said Bengt Norden, chairman of the Nobel committee for chemistry. The techniques developed by the Nobel Laureates assist with diagnosing cancer, monitoring doping in sports, analyzing environmental pollution, and have many other applications.

Dr. Fenn did his pioneering research on electrospray ionization while at the Department of Chemical Engineering at Yale. It may be the first time that work done in an engineering department has been recognized with a Nobel prize.

Electrospray ionization has brought about a revolution in the field of mass-spectrometry. It made possible the analysis by mass spectrometry of large and complex molecules of biological interest with extraordinary precision and ease. It is a soft ionization technique, that is, it is sufficiently gentle to transform such molecules into intact ions ready for mass analysis. Moreover, such ions carry so many charges that their mass/charge ratios are always within the range of modest mass -spectrometer mass filters.

Dr. Fenn used to say, while at Yale, that the dawning of a new era in the mass spectrometry of biomolecules was just one more fruit from the tree of his thirty year love affair with big leaks in vacuum systems. Dr. Fenn, Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering, knew that his "deliberate leaks" would long continue to be a rich source of both basic information and solutions to practical problems. "What more could an engineer want?" 

                                                             Photo: William Sacco
Prof. John Fenn at Yale in 1987 

John Fenn received his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1940, worked in industry and then joined the faculty of the Department of Chemical Engineering at Yale, where he taught and did research for 20 years (1967 to 1987) until mandated retirement (the laws have since changed). He continued to do research at Yale as a Senior Research Scientist in Chemical Engineering until 1994.

Dr. Fenn's wife, Magee, was a member of the Yale University Women's Organization, YUWO, and chaired a new scholarship for continuing education for women connected with the Yale community. When Mrs. Fenn died from injuries sustained in a car accident while in New Zealand, YUWO established a scholarship in her memory for continuing education for women connected with the Yale community. The Fenn family has been a generous supporter of the scholarship and the Fenn's daughter, Barbara Reif, Director of Student and Alumnae Affairs at the Yale School of Nursing, awards the scholarships in her mother's memory. The Fenns' other daughter, Marianne Steinberg, lives in Manhattan and John Fenn Jr. lives in Canoga Park, CA. 

Prof. Fenn is the author of more than 100 papers in scientific journals and of a book; he has also received 19 patents (some with co-inventors).

He has taught at the University of Trento in Italy, at the University of Tokyo, at a research institute in Bangalore, and at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing.

Prof. Fenn has remarried and is currently a research professor at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA.

Professor Emeritus John Fenn collecting his thoughts 
October 19, 2002, in Mason Lab 211, where he had given 
many a class during his 20 years of teaching at Yale 

(below) Prof. Fenn speaking during the Engineering Alumni 
Reunion October 18-20, 2002, about the research which 
he had done while at Yale for which he won the Nobel Prize