Carlos Bustamante

Life

Bustamante is since 1998 professor of molecular biology and cell biology, physics and chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. He received his B. S. of the Cayetano Heredia University in Lima, his masters in biochemistry from San Marcos University and his Ph.D. Biophysics from UC Berkeley, where he studied with Ignacio Tinoco, Jr.. As a post-doctoral researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Bustamante studied with Marc Maestre. Before moving to Berkeley, he conducted research at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Oregon.

Research focus

Carlos Bustamante uses novel methods of single -molecule visualization to study the structure and functions of nucleoproteins. He also used the optical tweezers.

Positions

• Research Assistant, University of California, Berkeley (1976-1981)
• Postdoctoral Fellow, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley (1981-1982)
• Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry, University of New Mexico (1982-1986)
• Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry, University of New Mexico (1986-1989)
• Professor of Chemistry, Department of Chemistry, University of New Mexico (1989-1990)
• Professor of Chemistry and Member of the Institute of Molecular Biology, University of Oregon (1991-1998)
• Professor in Molecular and Cell Biology, Chemistry, and Physics, UC Berkeley (since 1998)

Fellowships and Awards

• Kellogg Foundation scholarship during the Master in Biochemistry (1973-1975)
• Fulbright Commission and the Institute of International Education Fellow (1975-1976)
• Abraham Rosenberg Scholarship, UC Berkeley (1975-1976)
• Searle Scholar (1984 )
• Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellow (1985 )
• Presidential Lecturer in Chemistry, University of New Mexico (1986 )
• State of New Mexico Eminent Scholar (1989 )
• Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator (1994-1998, 2000)
• Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society ( 1995)
• Member of the Science Advisory Board of the Searle Scholars Program (1997-2000)
• Sackler Prize in Biophysics ( 2012)