Carolyn Bertozzi

Carolyn Bertozzi
Born	Carolyn Ruth Bertozzi 10 10, 1966
Birthplace	Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Nationality	American
Occupation	Chemist, professor
Title	Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences
Employer	Stanford University
Known for	Bioorthogonal chemistry
Education	Ph.D., Chemistry (University of California, Berkeley, 1993)
Awards	Nobel Prize in Chemistry (2022), MacArthur Fellowship (1999), Lemelson–MIT Prize (2010)
Website	Official site

Carolyn Ruth Bertozzi (born October 10, 1966) is an American chemist and Nobel laureate whose research has reshaped the boundary between chemistry and biology. She coined the term "bioorthogonal chemistry" to describe chemical reactions that can occur inside living systems without disrupting native biological processes — a concept that has opened new avenues in the study and treatment of diseases including cancer, inflammation, and viral infections. At Stanford University, Bertozzi holds the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professorship in the School of Humanities and Sciences and serves as an Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). In 2022, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry jointly with Morten P. Meldal and Karl Barry Sharpless "for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry," becoming one of only a handful of women to receive the prize. Over a career spanning more than three decades, Bertozzi has combined fundamental discoveries in glycoscience with translational applications, cofounded multiple biotechnology companies, and served on the boards of major pharmaceutical corporations. Her work developing chemical tools to study cell surface sugars known as glycans has had a significant impact on the understanding of how these molecules influence disease.

Early Life

Carolyn Ruth Bertozzi was born on October 10, 1966, in Boston, Massachusetts. She grew up in a family with strong academic and scientific inclinations. Her sister, Andrea Bertozzi, went on to become a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles. Their father, William Bertozzi, was a physicist on the faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Growing up in the Boston area, Bertozzi was exposed to the rich scientific and academic culture of the region's many universities and research institutions. She developed an early interest in the sciences, which would guide her through her educational career and into a research path that merged chemistry with biology in ways that had not previously been explored systematically.

Bertozzi has spoken publicly about her identity as an openly gay scientist, and in 2007 she was honored by the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP) for her achievements and her visibility in the scientific community.

Education

Bertozzi pursued her undergraduate education at Harvard University, where she studied chemistry. She then enrolled in the doctoral program in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, where she worked under the supervision of Mark D. Bednarski. Her doctoral dissertation, titled "Synthesis and biological activity of carbon-linked glycosides," was completed in 1993 and focused on the creation of synthetic sugar molecules and their interactions with biological systems. This early work on carbohydrate chemistry laid the intellectual foundation for her later research into glycans and bioorthogonal chemistry.

Following the completion of her Ph.D., Bertozzi undertook postdoctoral research, further developing her expertise in the interface of chemistry and biology before beginning her independent academic career at the University of California, Berkeley.

Career

University of California, Berkeley

Bertozzi joined the faculty at the University of California, Berkeley, where she established her independent research program focusing on the chemistry and biology of cell surface glycans — the complex sugar molecules that coat the surfaces of cells and play critical roles in biological processes including cell signaling, immune response, and pathogen recognition. Her laboratory developed methods for probing the roles of these sugars in living organisms, an area of research that had been hampered by the lack of adequate chemical tools.

During her time at Berkeley, Bertozzi developed the foundational concepts of bioorthogonal chemistry — chemical reactions designed to proceed in living systems without interfering with native biochemistry. These reactions enabled scientists, for the first time, to label and track specific glycans and other biomolecules in living cells and organisms, providing unprecedented insights into their biological functions. Her early published work in this area appeared in prominent scientific journals and attracted widespread attention from both the chemistry and biology communities.

Bertozzi also served as the director of the Molecular Foundry, a nanoscience research center at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where she oversaw interdisciplinary research at the intersection of nanoscience, chemistry, and biology.

Her achievements at Berkeley brought her rapid recognition. In 1999, at the age of 33, Bertozzi received the MacArthur Fellowship, commonly known as the "genius" grant, in recognition of her innovative contributions to chemistry and biology. She was also named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, a position she has continued to hold, which provides long-term research support for scientists pursuing innovative biomedical research.

In 2007, Bertozzi was among the Berkeley faculty members recognized with major awards, further solidifying her standing as one of the leading chemists of her generation.

Move to Stanford University

In 2015, Bertozzi moved from Berkeley to Stanford University, where she was appointed the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences. In an interview at the time of her appointment, Bertozzi discussed her research goals and the collaborative opportunities that Stanford offered for her work at the intersection of chemistry, biology, and medicine.

At Stanford, Bertozzi continued to expand the scope of bioorthogonal chemistry and its applications. Her laboratory has worked on developing chemical tools to study how glycans on cell surfaces affect diseases including cancer, inflammation, and viral infections such as COVID-19. Her group's research has explored how tumor cells exploit certain glycan modifications to evade the immune system, work that has potential implications for the development of new cancer therapies.

In 2025, Bertozzi and Jim Brooks of Stanford University were awarded a Stanford Cancer Institute Innovation Grant for research into prostate cancer, reflecting her ongoing work applying chemical biology approaches to oncology.

Since 2024, Bertozzi has also served as a scientific advisory board member of the Arc Institute, a research organization focused on advancing biomedical science.

Bioorthogonal Chemistry

The central intellectual contribution of Bertozzi's career has been the development of bioorthogonal chemistry. The term, which she coined, refers to chemical reactions that can take place within living systems without interfering with native biological processes. This represented a significant conceptual advance because it allowed researchers to use chemistry to study biology in its natural context — inside living cells and organisms — rather than relying solely on experiments in test tubes or on purified molecules.

Bertozzi's approach built upon and extended the concept of click chemistry, which was pioneered by Karl Barry Sharpless and independently by Morten P. Meldal. While click chemistry described a class of efficient, selective chemical reactions, Bertozzi's innovation was to adapt these and develop new reactions that could be performed safely in biological environments. Her development of the Staudinger ligation and strain-promoted azide-alkyne cycloaddition (SPAAC), also known as copper-free click chemistry, were critical milestones. These reactions allowed the selective labeling of biomolecules, particularly glycans, in living cells and animals without the toxicity associated with metal catalysts.

The impact of bioorthogonal chemistry has extended well beyond glycobiology. The tools developed by Bertozzi and her laboratory have been adopted by researchers across many fields, including drug development, diagnostics, and materials science. The ability to perform selective chemical reactions in living systems has enabled new approaches to studying protein function, tracking cellular processes in real time, and developing targeted therapies.

ACS Central Science

In 2014, it was announced that Bertozzi would serve as the inaugural editor-in-chief of ACS Central Science, the first peer-reviewed open access journal published by the American Chemical Society. The journal was designed to offer all of its content free to the public, reflecting a commitment to broadening access to scientific research. Bertozzi's appointment to this role underscored her standing in the broader chemistry community and her interest in science communication and open access publishing.

Industry and Corporate Roles

In addition to her academic research, Bertozzi has been active in translating her scientific discoveries into commercial applications. She has cofounded several biotechnology companies, including Palleon Pharmaceuticals, which focuses on the role of glycobiology in the immune system and the development of therapies that target glycan-mediated immune evasion in cancer.

Bertozzi has also served on corporate boards. She was a member of the board of directors of Eli Lilly and Company from 2017 to 2022. She departed the board in connection with a deal involving Lycia Therapeutics, another company she cofounded. In December 2025, Bertozzi was elected to return to the Eli Lilly board of directors as a returning member.

Her involvement in industry has drawn attention to the broader challenges faced by women scientists in corporate governance. A Scientific American article examined the barriers women in biotechnology encounter when seeking board positions, and Bertozzi's career has been cited in discussions of these issues.

Personal Life

Bertozzi is openly gay and has been recognized for her visibility as an LGBTQ+ scientist. In 2007, the National Organization of Gay and Lesbian Scientists and Technical Professionals (NOGLSTP) honored her at its annual awards ceremony alongside several other notable scientists and professionals.

Her sister, Andrea Bertozzi, is a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles, specializing in applied mathematics and fluid dynamics. Their father, William Bertozzi, was a professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Recognition

Bertozzi has received numerous awards and honors over the course of her career, reflecting the breadth and impact of her contributions to chemistry and biology.

In 1999, she received the MacArthur Fellowship at the age of 33, one of the youngest scientists to receive the award at that time.

In 2005, Bertozzi was elected to the National Academy of Sciences, one of the highest honors for a scientist in the United States. She was subsequently elected to the Institute of Medicine (now the National Academy of Medicine) in 2011 and to the National Academy of Inventors in 2013.

In 2010, Bertozzi became the first woman to receive the Lemelson–MIT Prize faculty award, a prize recognizing outstanding inventors.

Since 2021, Bertozzi has been a member of the Accademia dei Lincei, one of the oldest scientific academies in the world.

In 2022, Bertozzi was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, shared with Morten P. Meldal and Karl Barry Sharpless, "for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry." The Nobel Committee recognized her specific contribution in extending click chemistry into the realm of living systems through the development of bioorthogonal reactions.

In February 2026, the Royal Society of Chemistry awarded Bertozzi an Honorary Fellowship for her contributions to chemistry and human health. The society also recognized her earlier receipt of the Priestley Medal, one of the most distinguished honors in American chemistry.

Bertozzi has also been named an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, a distinction that provides long-term support for her research and recognizes her as one of the leading biomedical scientists in the United States.

Legacy

Bertozzi's development of bioorthogonal chemistry has had a transformative effect on multiple scientific disciplines. By creating chemical reactions that can be performed inside living organisms without disrupting natural biological processes, she enabled a new paradigm in chemical biology — one in which researchers can observe and manipulate biomolecules in their native environments. This work has influenced fields ranging from glycobiology and immunology to drug development and diagnostics.

Her work on glycans has been particularly significant. Prior to Bertozzi's contributions, the study of cell surface sugars was hindered by a lack of tools for visualizing and manipulating these molecules in living systems. Her laboratory's development of metabolic labeling strategies and bioorthogonal reactions for glycan imaging provided the scientific community with powerful new methods for studying carbohydrate biology, an area that had long lagged behind genomics and proteomics in terms of available research tools.

Beyond her scientific contributions, Bertozzi's career has served as a model for the integration of fundamental research with translational applications. Her founding of biotechnology companies focused on glycobiology-based therapeutics has demonstrated how basic discoveries in chemistry can be developed into potential treatments for cancer and other diseases.

Her leadership of ACS Central Science as the first open access journal of the American Chemical Society reflected a commitment to making scientific research more broadly accessible. Her visibility as an openly gay scientist and as a woman in a field historically dominated by men has also contributed to broader discussions about diversity and representation in the sciences.

As of 2026, Bertozzi continues her research at Stanford University and maintains active roles in both academic and corporate settings, including her positions on the Eli Lilly board of directors and the scientific advisory board of the Arc Institute.