Benjamin Cravatt, PhD, the Norton B. Gilula Chair in Biology and Chemistry at Scripps Research, is the recipient of the 2024 Bristol Myers Squibb Award for Enzyme Chemistry, which is administered by the Division of Biological Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (ACS). Established last year, the award recognizes individuals whose discoveries are impacting the biotechnology sphere and are likely to benefit human health.

Cravatt’s research aims to understand the roles that proteins play in human disease, with the intent of identifying new therapeutic targets and medications to treat a spectrum of disorders. Among his many accomplishments across chemical biology and biochemistry, Cravatt pioneered activity-based protein profiling, a technique that captures the activity and drug interactions of proteins and enzymes on a global scale. This method has led to the discovery of inhibitors and candidate drugs for diverse enzymes and other protein types to treat neurological disorders and various forms of cancer.

Throughout his career, Cravatt has received numerous awards and honors, including a Searle Scholar Award, the Eli Lilly Prize in Biological Chemistry, a Cope Scholar Award, the ASBMB Merck Award, the RSC Jeremy Knowles Award, the AACR Award for Achievement in Chemistry in Cancer Research and the Wolf Prize in Chemistry. He is also a member of the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences.

Cravatt will be honored at an awards symposium in August during the 2024 Fall ACS National Meeting in Denver, Colo.