Skip to content
Nobel Jews
Portrait of David Baker
Photo: Jeffreyjgray, Own work · CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Nobel Prize in Chemistry · 2024

David Baker

Turned the computer into a workshop for building proteins that never existed in nature, aimed at disease, pollution and energy.

The Nobel citation: “for computational protein design”
Born
1962, Seattle, WA, USA
Shared with
Demis Hassabis, John Jumper
Affiliation at the time
University of Washington, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, USA

Chemistry prize

2024

Shared with 2 other laureates.

Age that year

62years

Born in 1962.

Sources cited

28

Fact-checked September 24, 2026.

  • He started at Harvard in social studies and philosophy, and only took the biology course that redirected his life in his final year.
  • Top7, designed in his laboratory in 2003, folds into a shape found nowhere in nature; at 93 amino acids it was larger than any protein previously designed from scratch.
  • He told his Nobel interviewer that his 101st PhD student had graduated just before he left for Stockholm.
  • Both his parents are retired University of Washington scientists, a physicist and a geophysicist, and both travelled to Stockholm for the ceremony.
  • He donated a ski pole that had snapped in half to the Nobel Prize Museum, as a reminder to keep going when plans break.

The breakthrough

Designing proteins that never existed, then building them

Proteins do almost every job in a living cell. Each one is a chain of amino acids, usually 20 different kinds, that folds into a precise three-dimensional shape, and the shape decides what the protein can do. For decades the hard question was how to read a chain and work out the shape it would fold into.

Baker's laboratory in Seattle built a computer program called Rosetta to attack that question, and it did well in the international prediction contest CASP from 1998. Then came the idea that won the prize: run the program backwards. Instead of feeding in a chain and asking for a shape, draw the shape you want and ask the computer which chain would fold into it.

In 2003 his group tested this. They sketched a structure unlike anything in nature, let Rosetta propose an amino acid sequence, wrote that sequence into a gene, put the gene into bacteria and let the bacteria make the protein. The result, Top7, folded almost exactly as designed. It is a little like designing an aircraft from the principles of flight rather than by modifying a bird, an analogy Baker himself has used.

His group released the code, so laboratories everywhere could build on it, and after 2020 rebuilt the method around deep learning, which made designing new proteins far faster.[1],[2],[3],[4],[6],[14],[16]

“In nature, proteins solve pretty much all the problems that arose during evolution in marvellous ways.”
David Baker, From his Nobel Week interview in Stockholm, December 2024, explaining why he works on proteins.[6]

What it meant for humanity

Nature took billions of years of trial and error to produce its proteins. Baker's field lets people sketch a molecule for a problem that evolution never faced, then make it and test it in the laboratory.

The clearest case so far is a vaccine. Two laboratories at his institute designed a ball of protein carrying 60 copies of a fragment of the coronavirus spike; in mice it raised far more neutralising antibody than the spike alone, at a lower dose. SK bioscience developed it as SKYCovione, approved in South Korea in June 2022 and in the United Kingdom, and given a World Health Organization emergency listing in 2023. His institute describes it as the world's first computationally designed protein medicine, and Baker has credited its design to his colleague Neil King. Its real-world use was small, because by 2022 most people had already been vaccinated.

The wider effect is on how research is done. Rosetta was shared freely, extended by a worldwide consortium, and turned into a volunteer computing project and an online puzzle game whose players matched or beat algorithms at folding proteins. Designed proteins from his laboratory now include enzymes, chemical sensors, binders aimed at influenza, molecular switches, and proteins that neutralised snake neurotoxins in mice, aimed at a form of poisoning that kills more than 100,000 people a year. Most of this is still laboratory work, not treatment.

  • In 2003 his group designed Top7, a protein with a fold unknown in nature, and the crystal structure matched the computer model to within 1.2 angstroms.[3],[14]
  • A protein nanoparticle designed at his institute became SKYCovione, approved in South Korea in June 2022 and described by the institute as the first approved medicine based on a computationally designed protein.[5],[18],[19],[22],[28]
  • Rosetta's code was released publicly, and tens of thousands of non-scientists played the Foldit puzzle game; a 2010 Nature paper found that top players could beat the software on some hard folding problems.[3],[4],[13],[15]
  • Designed proteins from his laboratory neutralised three families of snake neurotoxin in the laboratory and protected mice from a lethal dose; snakebite kills more than 100,000 people a year, mostly in poorer countries.[4],[17]
  • He said in December 2024 that his 101st PhD student had just graduated, and he has consistently released methods openly so other laboratories can use them.[3],[6]

Impact in numbers

Most of what Baker's work has changed cannot honestly be counted yet. He opened a way of making molecules to order rather than borrowing them from nature, and gave the software away, so thousands of researchers now design proteins that did not exist before. The catalogue from his own laboratory is long: enzymes, sensors, vaccines, molecular switches, antitoxins. But almost all of it is still laboratory work. The first designed protein medicine to be approved, a COVID-19 vaccine built at his institute, arrived after the pandemic wave it was built for had passed and was given to only a few thousand people. The honest summary is a field with enormous promise, a training legacy of more than a hundred doctoral scientists, an unusual insistence on open sharing, and, so far, a very small number of people actually treated.

HealthFundamental scienceTechnology

No number is given here on purpose. Some contributions cannot be counted honestly, and we would rather describe them than invent a figure.

The double edge

The same software that designs a medicine could, in principle, help design a dangerous protein. Baker has said so himself and has argued publicly for safeguards: with George Church he called in Science in 2024 for records of synthetic gene orders to be kept and searched in emergencies, and he signed a community statement committing signatories to buy DNA only from suppliers that screen orders. The risk is not theoretical. A 2025 Science study found that AI-redesigned versions of proteins of concern could slip past the screening tools that synthesis companies rely on, until the authors built and distributed patches. A second, smaller problem is disappointment: the COVID-19 vaccine built on his institute's designs arrived after demand had collapsed, and although South Korea had agreed to buy ten million doses, only a few thousand shots were given before production stopped.

  • Moderate

    Design tools that could be misused

    Baker and George Church wrote in Science in 2024 that protein design is vulnerable to misuse for producing dangerous biological agents, and proposed that all synthetic gene sequence and synthesis records be stored and queried in emergencies. In March 2024 Baker and other researchers signed a statement of values for AI-assisted protein design committing them to use only DNA synthesis providers that screen orders for hazardous sequences.[23],[24]

  • Moderate

    AI-redesigned sequences evaded biosecurity screening

    A 2025 study in Science tested open-source AI protein design software against the screening tools that nucleic acid synthesis providers use. Redesigned variants of proteins of concern were not reliably detected. The authors developed and deployed patches that greatly improved detection, but the episode showed that safeguards lag behind the design tools.[25]

  • Minor

    A vaccine approved too late to be used

    SKYCovione, built on nanoparticles designed at his institute, was approved in South Korea in June 2022, after most Koreans had been vaccinated and as variants displaced the strain it targeted. Of 600,000 doses sent to hospitals, 3,787 shots had been given by November 2022. Production stopped, and the national disease agency's head said unused doses would likely be discarded. The WHO withdrew its emergency listing in May 2024.[20],[21],[22]

Against the odds

Baker's life is a useful reminder that adversity is not the whole Jewish story in America. He was born in Seattle in 1962 to two university scientists, and nothing in the record suggests he was ever held back for being Jewish.

That was not true a generation or two earlier. From about 1920 Columbia, Harvard and Yale used geography, legacy preference and vague judgements of character to hold down the number of Jewish students; the practice only became untenable after the Second World War and the Holocaust, and real change in admissions came in the 1960s. Baker entered Harvard in 1980, a university that had once kept many Jewish applicants out. In his own city, property deeds carried racial and sometimes religious restrictions until they were banned in 1968; the University of Washington's Racial Restrictive Covenants Project has found such restrictions on more than 37,000 King County properties.

His obstacles were of another kind. When he joined the University of Washington in 1993, the executive director of his institute has said that his ideas were seen as "crazy", and he has described spending much of his career on what he calls the lunatic fringe, working on problems where failure was the normal result for years at a time.

  • —

    Quota

    Ivy League universities, including Harvard where Baker studied from 1980, had used quotas and subjective admissions criteria from the 1920s to limit Jewish enrolment; these were dismantled in the decades before he applied. This is context for his family's generation, not something he experienced.[26]

  • —

    Discrimination

    In Baker's home county, deeds carried racial and sometimes religious restrictions on who could own or occupy property until such covenants were outlawed in 1968. The University of Washington's project has documented restrictions covering more than 37,000 King County properties.[27]

  • 1993

    Other

    When he began at the University of Washington his approach was treated as unrealistic. The executive director of his own institute later said that his ideas were seen as crazy, and Baker has described working for years on problems where failure was the norm.[6],[10]

Jewish background

Both parents JewishRelationship to Jewish identity not documented

Baker was born in Seattle in 1962 into a Jewish family, the son of the physicist Marshall Baker and the geophysicist Marcia Bourgin Baker. JINFO, which compiles laureates' ancestry, lists him as Jewish and names his grandparents: Louis and Betty (née Ginsberg) Baker on his father's side, and David and Rose (née Landfield) Bourgin, married in Chicago in 1935 by a rabbi, on his mother's. The Jewish Virtual Library also says he was born into a Jewish family. He has not spoken publicly, in the sources found, about religious practice or what Jewish identity means to him, so his own relationship to it is recorded as unknown.[7],[8],[9],[10],[11],[12]

Key dates

  1. 1962

    Born in Seattle, Washington, to physicist Marshall Baker and geophysicist Marcia Bourgin Baker.[1],[7],[12]

  2. 1980

    Graduates from Garfield High School in Seattle.[11]

  3. 1984

    Takes a bachelor's degree at Harvard University, switching from philosophy and social studies to biology after a course in his final year.[3],[6],[7]

  4. 1989

    Completes a PhD in biochemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, in Randy Schekman's laboratory.[2],[7]

  5. 1993

    Joins the University of Washington School of Medicine after postdoctoral work with David Agard in San Francisco, and starts work on how proteins fold.[3],[7],[10]

  6. 1998

    Enters the Rosetta program in the CASP structure prediction contest for the first time, with strong results.[3]

  7. 2000

    Becomes an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.[7],[13]

  8. 2003

    His group designs and builds Top7, the first protein with a fold unlike any in nature, and publishes it in Science.[3],[14]

  9. 2008

    Foldit, a protein-folding puzzle game built on Rosetta, opens to the public after the Rosetta@home volunteer computing project.[4],[7],[15]

  10. 2012

    The Institute for Protein Design is founded at the University of Washington, with Baker as director.[10],[28]

  11. 2020

    Laboratories at his institute publish a designed protein nanoparticle carrying 60 copies of the coronavirus spike fragment as a vaccine candidate.[18],[19]

  12. June 2022

    SKYCovione, the vaccine built on that nanoparticle, is approved in South Korea, the first approved medicine based on a computationally designed protein.[5],[22],[28]

  13. January 2024

    With George Church, argues in Science for keeping records of synthetic gene orders so protein design stays safe as AI makes it more powerful.[23]

  14. December 10, 2024

    Receives half of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for computational protein design; the other half goes to Demis Hassabis and John Jumper.[1],[2],[12]

Sources

  1. 1.David Baker - Facts - 2024 · Nobel Prize Outreach (nobelprize.org), 2024
  2. 2.Press release: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 · The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, 2024
  3. 3.They have revealed proteins' secrets through computing and artificial intelligence (popular science background) · The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, 2024
  4. 4.De Novo Protein Design (Nobel Prize lecture, 8 December 2024) · Nobel Prize Outreach, 2024
  5. 5.David Baker - Interview (telephone interview, 9 October 2024) · Nobel Prize Outreach, 2024
  6. 6.Transcript from an interview with David Baker (Nobel Week, 6 December 2024) · Nobel Prize Outreach, 2024
  7. 7.David Baker (biochemist) · Wikipedia, 2026
  8. 8.Jewish Nobel Prize Winners in Chemistry (note 24: ancestry of David Baker) · JINFO.org, 2024
  9. 9.David Baker · Jewish Virtual Library, 2024
  10. 10.David Baker, a UW professor who grew up in Seattle, wins Nobel Prize (Jenn Smith) · The Seattle Times, 2024
  11. 11.Garfield Alum Awarded Nobel Prize in Chemistry · Seattle Public Schools, 2024
  12. 12.David Baker among Nobel laureates honored in Stockholm · UW Medicine Newsroom, University of Washington, 2024
  13. 13.David Baker, PhD (investigator profile) · Howard Hughes Medical Institute, 2024
  14. 14.Design of a novel globular protein fold with atomic-level accuracy (Kuhlman B, Dantas G, Ireton GC, Varani G, Stoddard BL, Baker D), Science 302:1364-1368 · Science (PubMed record), 2003
  15. 15.Predicting protein structures with a multiplayer online game (Cooper S, Khatib F, Treuille A, et al.), Nature 466:756-760 · Nature (Crossref record), 2010
  16. 16.De novo design of protein structure and function with RFdiffusion (Watson JL, Juergens D, Bennett NR, et al.), Nature 620:1089-1100 · Nature (Crossref record), 2023
  17. 17.De novo designed proteins neutralize lethal snake venom toxins (Vazquez Torres S, Benard Valle M, et al., Baker D), Nature 639:225-231 · Nature (PubMed record), 2025
  18. 18.Elicitation of potent neutralizing antibody responses by designed protein nanoparticle vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 (Walls AC, Fiala B, et al., King NP), Cell 183:1367-1382 · Cell (PubMed record), 2020
  19. 19.COVID-19 vaccine with IPD nanoparticles seeks full approval · Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, 2022
  20. 20.Production of Korea's first homegrown COVID-19 vaccine suspended · The Korea Herald, 2022
  21. 21.Unused doses of S. Korea's first homegrown vaccine likely to be discarded · Yonhap News Agency, 2022
  22. 22.Skycovione · Wikipedia, 2026
  23. 23.Protein design meets biosecurity (Baker D, Church G), Science 383:349 · Science (PubMed record), 2024
  24. 24.Community Values, Guiding Principles, and Commitments for the Responsible Development of AI for Protein Design · Responsible AI x Biodesign initiative, 2024
  25. 25.Strengthening nucleic acid biosecurity screening against generative protein design tools (Wittmann BJ, et al., Horvitz E), Science · Science (PubMed record), 2025
  26. 26.How the Ivy League's Jewish quotas shaped higher education (Susan H. Greenberg, interview with Mark Oppenheimer) · Inside Higher Ed, 2022
  27. 27.Racial Restrictive Covenants Project: King County · University of Washington (Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project), 2024
  28. 28.Institute for Protein Design (impact and vaccine pages) · University of Washington, 2026

Fact-checked on September 24, 2026 by a separate AI fact-checking pass that re-opened the sources, with 10 corrections made. How we check

Suggest a correction