Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Boyer (Paul D.) papers
LSC.2156
View entire collection guide
Search this collection
Table of contents
Contributing Institution:
UCLA Library Special Collections
Title: Paul D. Boyer papers
Identifier/Call Number: LSC.2156
Physical Description:
19.4 Linear Feet
(47 boxes and 3 half boxes)
Date (inclusive): 1943-2009
Date (bulk): 1960-1993
Abstract: Paul D. Boyer won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1997 for his research on the binding change mechanism and rotational catalysis
of the ATP synthase complex, which he performed at UCLA in the 1960-70s. This collection contains his professional papers,
documenting his career as an academic at the University of Minnesota (1946-1963) and UCLA (1963-present [Emeritus]), where
he was Director of the Molecular Biology Institute (MBI). Of particular note is Boyer's correspondence with other major bioenergeticists
of the twentieth century including Efraim Racker and Nobelist Peter Mitchell, and regarding UCLA specifically, the naming
of UCLA's Boyer Hall on campus.
Physical Location: Stored off-site. All requests to access special collections material must be made in advance using the request button located
on this page.
Language of Material: Materials are in English.
Open for research, with the following exceptions: restricted student and award nominee information. All requests to access
special collections materials must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.
Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
CONTAINS UNPROCESSED DIGITAL MATERIALS: Digital materials are not currently available for access and will require further
processing and assessment. If you have questions about this material please email spec-coll@library.ucla.edu.
Conditions on Use and Reproduction
Property rights to the objects belong to UCLA Library Special Collections. All other rights, including copyright, are retained
by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue
the copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish where The UC Regents do not hold the copyright.
[Identification of item], Paul D. Boyer Papers (Collection 2156). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research
Library, University of California, Los Angeles.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Paul D. Boyer, 2014.
Processed by Jessica Cook and Joyce Wang in the
Center for Primary Research and Training (CFPRT) under the direction of Jillian Cuellar and Courtney Dean, Summer-Fall 2016.
Collections are processed to a variety of levels depending on the work necessary to make them usable, their perceived user
interest and research value, availability of staff and resources, and competing priorities. Library Special Collections provides
a standard level of preservation and access for all collections and, when time and resources permit, conducts more intensive
processing. These materials have been arranged and described according to national and local standards and best practices.
We are committed to providing ethical, inclusive, and anti-racist description of the materials we steward, and to remediating
existing description of our materials that contains language
that may be offensive or cause harm. We invite you to submit feedback about how our collections are described, and how they
could be described more accurately, by filling out the form
located on our website:
Report Potentially Offensive Description in Library Special
Collections.
UCLA Catalog Record ID:
9980221293606533
Paul D. Boyer (1918–present) was born on July 31st, 1918 in Provo, Utah. He graduated from Brigham Young University with a
B.S. in chemistry in 1939, was awarded a Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation Scholarship, and began his doctoral work at
the University of Wisconsin in 1939 in the lab of Paul H. Philips. Five days before leaving Provo, Boyer married fellow BYU
student Lyda Whicker. He received his PhD in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin in 1943, and moved to Stanford
to work in the lab of J. Murray Luck on a war-related research project on the stabilization of serum albumin for transfusions.
In 1945 Boyer was drafted into the U.S. Navy (second class seaman) and sent to the Navy Medical Research Institute. In 1946
he became an Assistant Professor at University of Minnesota. In 1955 Boyer received a Guggenheim Fellowship to work with Nobelist
Hugo Theorell on alcohol dehydrogenase in Sweden, and also won the Award in Enzyme Chemistry from the American Chemical Society
(ACS) that year. In 1956 Boyer accepted the Hill Foundation Professorship at the University of Minnesota and moved to the
medical campus. He served as Chairman of the Biochemistry Section of the American Chemical Society from 1959-60.
In 1963 Boyer moved to UCLA, and in 1965 accepted the more administrative Directorship of the new Molecular Biology Institute
(MBI). From 1969-70 Boyer also served as President of the American Society of Biological Chemists. In late 1970 Boyer's lab
made a breakthrough discovery, formulating the first major aspect of what, along with his later theory of catalytic cooperativity
(developed in the mid-1970s), became the binding change mechanism. He was eventually awarded the 1997 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
for this research, after John Walker's crystallographic studies confirmed Boyer's formulation (Boyer, Walker, and Jens Skou
shared the 1997 Prize).
From 1963-89 Boyer served as either Editor or Associate Editor of the Annual Review of Biochemistry, and from 1970-90 he was
the Editor of the multivolume biochemistry series The Enzymes. In addition to his Nobel Prize he received numerous awards,
including the Rose Award of the American Society of Chemistry and Molecular Biology (1989) and honorary doctorates from the
Universities of Stockholm (1974), Minnesota (1996), and Wisconsin (1998). He is a Member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Boyer's lab largely stopped preforming research around 1993, and after which he spent an increasing amount of his time in
Wyoming with his wife, Lyda. They have three children (Gail, Hali, and Douglas) and eight grandchildren.
This collection contains materials largely related to Paul Boyer's professional career, most significantly research notes,
article manuscripts, conference attendance, and correspondence related to his Nobel Prize-winning research on the binding
change mechanism and rotational catalysis in the ATP synthase complex. This collection is especially strong in correspondence,
containing Boyer's extensive research correspondence with Nobelist Peter Mitchell, bioenergeticist Efraim Racker, Richard
Cross, Britton Chance, Henry Lardy, and James Peter. The collection also contains extensive article manuscripts with data,
notes, and revisions. Lastly, the collection contains UCLA-specific materials such as documentation of the beginnings of the
MBI, the naming of Boyer Hall, and the creation of the Boyer Postdoctoral fund.
Overall, materials are arranged alphabetically by topic within their series, then chronologically.
This collection has been arranged into the following series:
- Series 1: Academia, 1941-2008
- Subseries 1.1: Teaching, Academic Appointments, Personal Information, 1941-1999
- Subseries 1.2: Publications, 1949-2007
- Subseries 1.3: Conferences, 1967-2005
- Subseries 1.4: Professional Societies, 1955-2008
- Subseries 1.5: UCLA, 1974-2009
- Series 2: Correspondence, 1943-2009
- Series 3: Awards and Donations, 1951-2009
- Series 4: Government Funding and Contracts, 1955-1995
Subjects and Indexing Terms
University of California, Los Angeles. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry--Faculty -- Archives