SUMMER 200524 UF TODAY 2524

As a sophomore anthropology major, Adam Bennett (BS ’04) sat doodling in his

notebook in the back of his linguistics class. It wasn’t that the lecture wasn’t interesting; Bennett loved his coursework in cultural anthropology. Rather, it was the strange shape the doodle was forming that held Bennett’s attention.

It was organic chemistry.“What I had drawn was actually an organic

synthesis problem I had made up and was trying to solve,” he says. “At that point, I realized I needed to go speak to someone about changing my major.”

Bennett entered the chemistry track at UF then and hasn’t looked back since.

Now 22, he has found his niche in AIDS research, coordinating an international collaboration to determine the structure of HIV-1 and its anti-bodies. Dividing his time between labs in England, Washington, D.C., and Dresden, Germany, Bennett uses electron microscopy to demystify how the virus functions in the human body. He hopes his work will eventually help scientists develop a vaccine to fight AIDS.

“Knowing all of the detailed structures of HIV will allow us to defeat it,” Bennett says. “Trial-and-error approaches to HIV-vaccine design have largely failed. Vaccine candidates who are based on detailed knowledge of the virus structure have been much more successful.”

Bennett’s research is part of a program he designed by combining postgraduate scholarships from the Winston Churchill Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. Accepted into both programs and faced with choosing between them, Bennett per-suaded the directors of both scholarships to let him fulfill them simultaneously while working toward a doctorate from Cambridge.

That kind of achievement and drive is typical of Bennett’s academic career, says associate professor of chemistry Jon Stewart, who was Bennett’s research adviser at UF.

Stewart recalled how Bennett stood out in his undergraduate chemistry class.

“I always give some kind of candy for the highest score on a test — something interesting, like Belgian truffles I’ve brought back from traveling in Europe,” he says. “When Adam took my class as a sophomore, he won the prize every time. That hasn’t happened since.”

Stewart says Bennett’s self-confidence and his ability to cut straight to the heart of a scientific issue set him apart from other young scientists. Bennett,

By Allison Clark (BSJ ’98)

Toothpicks,

FALL 200524

who grew up in Palm Harbor, says Stewart’s guidance helped him develop his research skills and his passion for the field.

“Dr. Jon Stewart is the reason I chose to focus on biochemistry,” Bennett says. “He inspired me from day one to follow in the footsteps of those researchers who had, in his words, worked out the fundamental chem-istry behind all life with ‘toothpicks and logic.’”

Coordinating an unprecedented international col-laboration means Bennett spends more time than he’d like on administrative tasks, but he sees it as valuable experience. The pathways that lead research from the lab to the public can be convoluted, and developing managerial and public relations skills is crucial, he says.

While he’s sometimes frustrated by lingering misconceptions about AIDS — he was recently asked whether HIV is spread by kissing, a common urban legend — Bennett remains optimistic that if researchers worldwide can collaborate, science will conquer the disease.

“It’s likely that an effective HIV vaccine candidate will emerge within the next 10 years,” he says. “It de-pends on many people seeing past their own short-term goals. The science is not the main uncertainty.” u

Chemist Adam Bennett (BS ’04) Believes

an AIDS Vaccine is Just a Matter of Time.

Logic and AIDS

“Knowing all of the

detailed structures

of HIV will allow us

to defeat it.”

— Adam BennettD

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