Photo credit: Instituto Leloir — Wikimedia Commons · Public domain
Luis F. Leloir
1906–1987 · Argentina · 20th century
Nobel Chemistry 1970
Argentine biochemist who discovered sugar nucleotides such as UDP-glucose and showed they carry sugars for building carbohydrates; the first Latin American chemistry laureate.
Nobel Prize work
He isolated UDP-glucose and related sugar nucleotides and proved they are the activated donors that enzymes use to build glycogen, sucrose and cell-wall polysaccharides. The finding explained how cells channel and transfer sugars, unifying the biochemistry of carbohydrate biosynthesis.
Fields
Related topics
Glucose, fructose, sucrose, starch, cellulose
Carbohydrates range from single sugars to giant polymers: the same glucose unit gives energy-storing starch or structural cellulose depending on how it is linked.
Metabolism (glycolysis, Krebs cycle, electron transport chain)
Metabolism is a network of linked reactions that captures energy and supplies building blocks; ATP and reduced cofactors connect pathways.