Class of 1922 Professor of Chemistry and Biology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Barbara Imperiali is the Class of 1922 Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Imperiali received her BSc in Medicinal Chemistry at University College London. She then proceeded to earn her PhD in Synthetic Organic Chemistry in 1983 at MIT. working under the supervision of Professor Satoru Masamune. Following this, she carried out postdoctoral studies at Brandeis University with the late Professor Robert Abeles. Dr. Imperiali began her professional career as an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University in 1986. In 1989, she joined the faculty at the California Institute of Technology where she earned the rank of Professor of Chemistry in 1997. In July 1999, Professor Imperiali assumed her current appointment at MIT. Barbara Imperiali is the recipient of a Sloan Fellowship (1993), a Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award (1993), the ACS Cope Scholar Award (1996) and the Caltech Feynman Prize for Excellence in Teaching (1998). At M.I.T. she has been awarded the School of Science Prize for excellence in undergraduate education (2002) and she has recently been named a Margaret MacVicar Fellow (2003) in recognition of her contributions to education at the Institute. In 2001, Imperiali was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 2004 she was named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.
Research in the Imperiali group is concerned with diverse aspects of protein structure, function and design. One area of investigation focuses on co-translational protein glycosylation. A second program is targeted at the design and implementation of new chemical probes into the study of complex biological systems.