Carlos F. Barbas III was a distinguished Kellogg Professor of Chemistry and Molecular Biology at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. Born on November 5, 1964 in St. Petersburg, Florida, he received his bachelor's degree in Chemistry from Eckerd College before earning his PhD in Organic Chemistry from Texas A&M University in 1989 under Professor Chi-Huey Wong. Following postdoctoral studies at Pennsylvania State University and The Scripps Research Institute, he joined the TSRI faculty in 1991 where he established himself as a visionary leader at the intersection of chemistry and biology. Dr. Barbas served as Chair of the Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology and held the Janet and W. Keith Kellogg II Endowed Chair, positions that reflected his significant contributions to the field of chemical biology and his leadership within the scientific community.
Dr. Barbas pioneered groundbreaking approaches at the interface of synthetic organic chemistry, molecular biology and medicine, fundamentally transforming therapeutic development. His laboratory achieved several landmark accomplishments including the development of the first human antibody phage libraries, the creation of the first synthetic antibodies and the development of the first artificial transcription factors capable of regulating endogenous genes. His work on chemically programmed antibodies established a new paradigm for targeted therapeutics, leading to novel drug classes currently in clinical trials or approved for various diseases. As a prolific inventor, he was named on 58 issued U.S. patents and authored over 330 scientific articles, with his research directly translating to clinical applications through multiple therapeutic approaches.
Beyond his research achievements, Dr. Barbas made significant contributions to the scientific community through educational leadership and entrepreneurship. Since 1992, he directed the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Annual Fall Course on Antibody Engineering and Phage Display, training generations of scientists in these critical techniques. His entrepreneurial spirit led him to found three companies: Prolifaron acquired by Alexion in 1997, CovX acquired by Pfizer in 2002 and Zyngenia founded in 2008, all dedicated to translating his research into clinical therapies. Dr. Barbas received numerous prestigious awards including the Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award, the Tetrahedron Young Investigator Award and the NIH Director's Pioneer Award, recognizing both his scientific contributions and his translational impact. His legacy continues to influence the development of novel therapeutic approaches despite his untimely death from medullary thyroid cancer on June 24, 2014.
