Rate My Professor Bertil Hille

Bertil Hille is Professor Emeritus and former Wayne E. Crill Endowed Professor in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at the University of Washington School of Medicine, where he has been a faculty member since 1968. He received his B.S. summa cum laude in Zoology from Yale University in 1962 and his Ph.D. in Life Sciences from The Rockefeller University in 1967. Following his doctoral training, Hille conducted postdoctoral research at the Physiological Laboratory, University of Cambridge, working with Nobel laureates Sir Alan Hodgkin and Richard Keynes. Throughout his career at the University of Washington, he has served as a researcher, teacher, mentor, and writer, contributing to the Department of Physiology and Biophysics for over 50 years before transitioning to emeritus status on July 1, 2021. He remains active in mentoring junior faculty and advising.

Hille's research specializations encompass cell and developmental biology, with pioneering contributions to the understanding of ion channels as selective, gated aqueous pores in excitable membranes. He distinguished sodium and potassium channels using pharmacological probes such as tetrodotoxin and tetraethylammonium, elucidated mechanisms of ionic selectivity through pore size limitations and saturable binding sites, and demonstrated state-dependent entry of local anesthetics into sodium channels. His work extended to modulation of ion channels by G-protein-coupled receptors, identifying a fast pathway via direct Gβγ subunit action on inward rectifier potassium and calcium channels, and a slow pathway involving phosphoinositide depletion, particularly PIP2 as an essential cofactor for numerous channels and transporters. Employing advanced biophysical methods including patch clamp electrophysiology, FRET, confocal and TIRF microscopy, and kinetic modeling, his studies have shaped neuronal and cardiac excitability models. Hille has authored over 200 papers and chapters, including the landmark textbook Ion Channels of Excitable Membranes (1984; 2nd ed. 1992; 3rd ed. 2001), hailed as the definitive reference and one of the most cited works in scientific literature. His profound impact on electrophysiology and cell signaling is evidenced by major awards, including the Bristol-Myers Squibb Award (1990), Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize (1996, shared with Clay Armstrong), Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research (1999, shared with Armstrong and Roderick MacKinnon), Gairdner Foundation International Award, election to the National Academy of Sciences (1986), National Academy of Medicine (2002), and American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1998). He has delivered prestigious lectures, such as the Bard Lecture at Johns Hopkins University (2009).