Paul Zamecnik, a Lasker award-winning biologist who co-discovered transfer RNA, died late last month at the age of 96. Zamecnik died at his Boston home after battling cancer.

Paul Zamecnik Image: Massachusetts General Hospital

In the mid-1950s, along with molecular biologists Mahlon Hoagland and Mary Stephenson, Zamecnik discovered the molecule responsible for transporting amino acids to ribosomes during protein synthesis, which the trio dubbed transfer RNA (tRNA). Little was known about the mechanism of protein synthesis up to that point. The team's discovery was made possible through the development of an in vitro protein synthesis modeling system in which Zamecnik used C¹⁴-labeled amino acids to observe peptide bond formation. The paper announcing the discovery of tRNA, published in 1958, has been cited more than 620 times, according to ISI's Web of Knowledge.

Later in his career, Zamecnik and Stephenson developed antisense technology, in which short, synthetic nucleotide sequences can be used to silence the activity of individual genes. They published their results, in which they used a 13-nucleotide sequence to halt production of Rous sarcoma virus in chicken embryos, in 1978. That paper, which appeared in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, has been cited more than 900 times, according to ISI.

Since then, researchers have explored antisense technology as a treatment approach for a variety of diseases, from viral infections and cancer to cardiovascular, autoimmune, and inflammatory diseases. One antisense drug, Isis Pharmaceutical's Vitravene, was commercialized in 1998 to treat cytomegalovirus retinitis in AIDS patients, and several others are in clinical trials.

Born in 1912, Zamecnik was "a Cleveland kid," according to his biography on the Lasker Foundation's website. Schooled as a physician, Zamecnik decided to devote his career to research while serving as an intern at University Hospitals in Cleveland in the late 1930s. The death of an obese patient, who had an overabundance of fat and a fatal dearth of protein, led him to question the process of protein synthesis. Zamecnik said in an interview featured on the Lasker website that the episode made him wonder how proteins were made in the body and how that process was regulated. "And I asked the people in medicine at the University Hospitals, 'Who is studying protein synthesis?' And they all shook their heads."

Almost six decades later, in 1996, Zamecnik was awarded the Albert Lasker Award for Special Achievement in Medical Science "for brilliant and original science that revolutionized biochemistry and spawned new avenues of scientific inquiry."

"Paul was a remarkable person to me," said Hoagland (who died earlier this year) in Zamecnik's Lasker Foundation biography. "He created a laboratory atmosphere that was very informal, very relaxed, very good fun, and very little pressure of competition in the laboratory. I think his whole attitude contributed significantly to an openness and sharing which, in turn, contributed to the success of the laboratory."

Zamecnik published more than 240 scientific papers during his career and is survived by two daughters, Karen Zamecnik and Elizabeth Coakley, one son, John, seven grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.


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