Arieh Warshel
Computational chemistry pioneer explaining how molecules and enzymes work
Arieh Warshel, born in 1940, helped turn the computer into a tool for investigating chemical reactions within biological systems. His work went beyond depicting a molecule’s shape to ask how it functions, how its energy changes and how its surroundings affect a reaction. For developing multiscale models of complex chemical systems, he shared the 2013 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Martin Karplus and Michael Levitt.
From a kibbutz to international research
Warshel was born at Kibbutz Sde Nahum. After military service in the Armored Corps, he studied chemistry at the Technion, graduating with highest honors. He completed advanced degrees under Shneior Lifson at Weizmann, where his collaboration with Levitt began. His research later took him to Harvard and Cambridge, and in 1976 he joined the University of Southern California.
Connecting different levels of description
A chemical reaction may involve a small region where bonds break and form, surrounded by a much larger environment that influences the outcome. Calculating the entire system in full quantum detail can be prohibitively demanding. Methods developed by Warshel and his colleagues combined a quantum description of the active region with a simpler treatment of its surroundings, retaining the detail relevant to the scientific question.
Warshel made particular contributions to understanding enzymes and how a protein’s environment and electrical interactions help accelerate reactions. This work strengthened the connection between molecular structure and an explanation of function. It provided tools for investigating biological processes and designing molecules.
Research across disciplines and borders
His career connects scientific training in Israel with laboratories around the world. The achievement required physics, chemistry, biology and programming, together with a willingness to build new tools when established methods could not answer a question.
Why this legacy belongs in Moreshet
Moreshet includes Warshel for a profound expansion in the ability to investigate the chemistry of life. His profile at Moreshet.com places Israeli education and research within an international development relevant to medicine and biotechnology. His contribution demonstrates that an idea’s importance can be measured by the new questions it makes possible to study.
