Russell Doolittle

Russell Doolittle, professor emeritus of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, San Diego, also held an appointment in the Section of Molecular Biology. Born January 10, 1931, in New Haven, Connecticut, he attended Wesleyan University from 1948 to 1952, obtained a master's degree in education from Trinity College in 1957, and completed his Ph.D. in biological chemistry at Harvard Medical School in 1961 in the laboratory of J. Lawrence Oncley. Following a postdoctoral fellowship at the Karolinska Institutet under Birger Blombäck from 1962 to 1964, funded by the National Institutes of Health, he arrived at UC San Diego in 1964 as an assistant research biologist under S. Jonathan Singer in the Department of Biology. In 1965, he was appointed assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, later joining the Division of Biological Sciences in 1987. He chaired the Chemistry Department from 1981 to 1984 and the Academic Senate from 1977 to 1978, served on the Executive and Policy Committee, the university-wide Academic Council, and 25 other Senate committees. Doolittle helped establish basic science programs in the undergraduate curriculum and for the School of Medicine.

His research centered on molecular evolution through comparative protein sequences, with a focus on fibrinopeptides and fibrinogen in blood clotting. He demonstrated evolutionary relationships among mammal species using fibrinopeptide sequences, constructed phylogenies for cetartiodactyls such as pigs, camels, deer, and bison, as well as primates including macaques, chimpanzees, and humans, and extended fibrinogen studies to lampreys and sea cucumbers. In the 1970s, his laboratory determined the amino acid sequences of human fibrinogen's three polypeptide chains totaling 1,810 residues, proposed its structure as three nodules connected by coiled coils, and described the molecular mechanism of its polymerization into fibrin fibers, later validated by X-ray crystallography. Doolittle created early searchable protein sequence databases like NEWAT, precursors to modern bioinformatics resources that aided the Human Genome Project, and linked a tyrosine kinase gene to cancer research. His honors include election to the National Academy of Sciences in 1984, Guggenheim Fellowship in 1984, Paul Ehrlich Prize in 1989, and the John J. Carty Award for the Advancement of Science in 2006. He presented 18 named lectures and passed away on October 11, 2019.