For a third of a century, the Robert A. Welch Foundation has supported (A-328) chemical and structural research in my laboratory.  I therefore have created this sculpture as a modest response for this sustaining generosity; with it I seek to show the hidden beauty of biomolecules.

Vitamin B12 played a crucial role in the research of four Welch awardees (Karl Folkers - 1972; Albert Eschenmoser - 1974; A. Ian Scott and Alan Battersby - 2000). Depicted in the sculpture is the center of the corrin macrocycle, four nitrogen atoms complexed to the central cobalt atom. The atomic coordinates were taken from the structure of glutamate mutase (Reitzer et al., Structure 7(8):891-902, 1999; PDB entry 1CB7). 

Program SCULPT generated "G-code" instructions for a cnc milling machine. Birdseye maple (29cm x 21cm x 4.5cm) was used to depict the central 5-atom nucleus of vitamin B12.

E. Meyer fecit, 2001