Tribute to Professor Michael John Welch (1939−2012)

Professor Michael Welch was a true pioneer in showingwhat a chemist can contribute to a Department of

Radiology. Before he started his career at WashingtonUniversity in 1967, there were no chemists developing newcyclotron-based imaging agents in radiology departments;Michael was an original, an innovator, and the person whohas become a model for a basic scientist in a clinicaldepartment. Dr. Welch was trained as a physical chemist andradiochemist. He received his education at CambridgeUniversity (BA 1961, MA 1965) and from Queen MaryCollege, University of London (PhD 1965) under ProfessorDavid Urch. After a postdoctoral stint with A.P. Wolf atBrookhaven National Laboratory, he moved to St. Louis wherehe spent 45 yrs pioneering new radioactive molecules forimaging human biology.Over the course of his career, Mike mentored as graduate

students, postdocs, and faculty colleagues over fifty of theleading scientists developing new radioactive imaging agents.Michael’s trainees are today’s leaders in industry and govern-ment as well as academia, and they can be found in everycorner of the globe. Dr. Welch was an ambassador to the world;he traveled tirelessly, and he lectured extensively as an advocatefor excellence in biomedical research. He served on numerouspeer review committees for NIH, DOE, DOD, and otheragencies in the United States and abroad. He had excellentinstincts for selecting the best students and the best researchproposals, and he provided sage scientific and strategic adviceto investigators, science administrators, and policy makers alike.Dr. Welch had a great passion for life, for his science, for his

family, and for sports and music, and he never did anythinghalfway. He was an accomplished swimmer and captain of hishigh school team, an avid fan of English football, and heenjoyed sailing. He could be seen at sporting events for thecollegiate and professional sports teams in the St. Louis area,and he took great pride in getting the best tickets to the mostsought-after musical concerts. Michael was also a loving andnurturing father to two children, Colin and Lesley, and forseveral years, as a family activity, Dr. Welch raised and showedchampion Norwegian Elk Hounds, often traveling on weekendswith his children to shows throughout the Midwest.Professor Welch’s research accomplishments cannot be easily

summarized. At the time of his death, his bibliography listedover 550 peer-reviewed papers and 73 book chapters, but thislist will grow as work already in progress is published by hismany collaborators. His early work involved very short-livedradionuclides to study human physiology at the Division ofRadiation Sciences, Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology,directed by Professor Michel Ter-Pogossian and with suchdistinguished colleagues as Professors Marcus Raichle, E. JamesPotchen, Barry Siegel, William Powers, and others. While hisresearch started with imaging agents labeled with 18F, 15O, 13N,and 11C, he developed a long list of metal-labeled imagingagents, beginning with 113mIn. This list subsequently extendedto isotopes of numerous metals and halogens. These imagingagents were used in a wide range of research, from basic human

physiology to neuroscience, heart and lung diseases, diabetesand cancer, both diagnosis and therapy. He pioneered methodsfor labeling cells, as well as proteins, peptides, and smallmolecules for imaging, and his research with 77Br-estradiol laidthe foundation for PET radioligands used today to imagereceptors in vivo.The list of honors bestowed on Dr. Welch is long and

includes the Nuclear Applications award of ACS, essentiallyevery award of the Society of Nuclear Medicine, of which heserved as President in1984, and several named lectureships. Hewas elected to the Institute of Medicine in 1996. Perhaps themost personal tribute to his stature as a visionary scholar andeducator was that Washington University flew the universityflag at half-staff for three days after his passing.Professor Welch is survived by his two children and five

grandchildren and by his long-time companion, Mickey Clark.He was remembered fondly by numerous friends andcolleagues, past and present, in a memorial service on thecampus of Washington University on June 4, 2012. His familyhas established a foundation in his memory to support researchand education in nuclear medicine: www.mjwelchfoundation.org.

Kenneth A. KrohnDepartment of Radiology, University of Illinois, 1959 NEPacific Street, Box 356004, Seattle, Washington 98195,United StatesJohn A. Katzenellenbogen

Published: August 18, 2012

Editorial

pubs.acs.org/bc

© 2012 American Chemical Society 1719 dx.doi.org/10.1021/bc300336k | Bioconjugate Chem. 2012, 23, 1719−1720

Department of Chemistry, University of Washington, 600S. Mathews Avenue, 461 RAL, Box 37-5 Urbana, Illinois61801, United States

■ AUTHOR INFORMATIONCorresponding AuthorsE-mail: jkatzene@illinois.edu. Phone: (217) 333-6310. Fax:(217) 333-7325.E-mail: kkrohn@uw.edu. Phone: (206) 598-6245. Fax: (206)598-4192.NotesThe authors declare no competing financial interest.

Bioconjugate Chemistry Editorial

dx.doi.org/10.1021/bc300336k | Bioconjugate Chem. 2012, 23, 1719−17201720