A meeting
of the mind

P eter Dervan got his first chance to organize a Welch Conference on Chemical Research in 1993. The chemistry professor at the California Institute of Technology had a few years earlier become a member of the Welch Foundation’s scientific advisory board—a group of eminent researchers who oversee almost every aspect of the foundation’s vast support for the chemical sciences. Organizing the annual conference is a duty that falls to board members on a rotating basis. It was Dervan’s turn the same year that marked the 40th anniversary of James Watson and Francis Crick’s seminal Nature paper on genetic material and the double helix structure of DNA. Dervan thought to himself: Why don’t I just invite Watson and Crick?

This year, the conference was organized by board member Xiaowei Zhuang (picture below), a biophysicist focused on finding ways to visualize how molecules interact within cells. Its focus was on the science of brain, as well as the causes of molecular and cellular dysfunction linked to neurological and psychiatric disorders.

Credit: Courtesy of Xiaowei Zhuang

Dervan also invited Thomas Cech, who won a chemistry Nobel in 1989 for his discovery of the catalytic properties of RNA; and a few scientists researching nucleic acids, including Thomas Steitz, whose work on the structure of the ribosome—the machine in cells that makes proteins—would also eventually be recognized with a Nobel. The group represented cutting-edge science and the top of their fields. But the allure of the Welch Conference was strong enough to draw them from across the US and the rest of the world. “I picked the top 12 speakers on planet Earth,” Dervan recalls. “And every single one of them said yes.”

A distinguished scientist in his own right, Dervan makes a point of attending the Welch Conference. Since many members of the scientific advisory board are also Nobel laureates, the themes represent a range of topics within the foundation’s purview—including the chemistry of genome editing and the science of water.

The 2021 conference was organized by Xiaowei Zhuang, a biophysicist focused on finding ways to visualize how molecules interact within cells. The event’s focus was the science of the brain, including the causes of molecular and cellular dysfunction linked to neurological and psychiatric disorders. Zhuang had a hand in nearly every aspect of the conference planning, choosing the topic as well as the speakers. As one of the foremost researchers in the area of brain science, developing tool kits for understanding the molecular networks inside one of the most mysterious organs, Zhuang’s influence meant that the event convened the ideas at the very forefront of the field.

Although the annual conference is one of its most high-profile events, the Welch Foundation—created at the behest of oil and gas entrepreneur Robert Alonzo Welch to advance chemical science for the betterment of humanity—also awards tens of millions of dollars in research funding every year. It supports 48 endowed chairs in chemical sciences, all in Texas. Through two significant awards—the Welch Award, a recognition for lifetime achievement, and the Norman Hackerman Award, given to a promising early-career scientist—the foundation showcases some of the most important work in chemical sciences.

Last year, the Welch Foundation announced the largest single gift in its history: a donation of $100 million to establish an institute for advanced materials at Rice University. Much like the Welch Conference, which casts an eye toward future horizons in chemical research, the Welch Institute for Advanced Materials is intended to set new paths for innovation. Carin Barth, the chair of the Welch Foundation’s board of directors, sees materials revolutionizing areas like space exploration and transportation and playing a critical role in energy storage with research into new kinds of batteries. Barth says that advanced materials is consistent with the foundation’s tradition of funding basic research in that it is a “burgeoning area where there was just not that much emphasis today but that would go across all areas of chemistry.”

One of the ways the institute will support materials research is by bringing together scientists and investigators to collaborate and benefit from one another’s work. That kind of intermingling is also at the heart of the Welch Conference, which is always held in Houston. This year’s event—held online for the first time ever, in October, after skipping 2020 because of the pandemic—assembling from different fields but all working to better understand the brain. In a virtual ceremony, Chi-Huey Wong was honored with the Welch Award, bestowed by the foundation annually to a scientist who has a significant track record and has made a major contribution to improving people’s lives. Wong, a professor of chemistry at Scripps Research in California, developed methods for synthesizing carbohydrates that have allowed closer study of biological glycosylation, or the process by which carbohydrates attach to other molecules. His research has contributed to understanding how glycosylation relates to cancer and other conditions and has helped in the development of medicines.

As the Welch Foundation expands its activities while maintaining its core research grant programs and support for universities across Texas, it is committed to keeping the conversation moving into the future by laying the groundwork for discoveries to come. “Without the fundamental understanding of science, it's difficult to do translational research. And without translational research, it's difficult to see the impact of your fundamental research,” Wong says. “So these two are side by side, and I think when we talk about the impact of your contribution to the society you need to have these two components together.”