Betzig, Eric (1960-…), an American physicist, shared the 2014 Nobel Prize in chemistry with the American physicist W. E. Moerner and the German physicist Stefan W. Hell . The scientists each received the prize for their work in overcoming a physical limitation of the optical (visible light) microscope . The limitation, first stated by the German physicist Ernst Abbe , is that an optical microscope can never achieve a resolution smaller than 200 nanometers wide. Resolution describes a microscope’s ability to clearly distinguish details. A nanometer is 0.000000001 meter (1/25,400,000 inch). The three prize winners were able to bypass the limit, producing optical images with a resolution many times smaller than 200 nanometers. Their processes enabled the resolution of structures as small as individual molecules . The award recognized two different methods, one developed by Hell and the other developed by Betzig and Moerner.
Certain molecules can absorb light and then fluoresce (glow) as a result. In 1989, Moerner succeeded in measuring the light absorption and fluorescence of a single molecule.
In 1995, Betzig had a paper published in which he outlined a method of bypassing the Abbe limit that built on Moerner’s work. Betzig suggested using fluorescent molecules of different colors to build an image one color at a time. As long as molecules of the same color were at least 200 nanometers apart, the microscope could resolve them clearly. The researcher could then cause different portions of a sample to fluoresce in different colors, maintaining the 200-nanometer spacing for each color. The different colors could then be superimposed (layered on top of one another) to produce a single image with a resolution under 200 nanometers. Using enough colors could enable researchers to bring the resolution down to the scale of individual molecules.
After publishing his 1995 paper, Betzig quit research and began working at his father’s machine tool company. He returned to his research several years later upon hearing of the development of green fluorescent protein (GFP), a protein that can bind to other proteins and illuminate them. The real breakthrough occurred for Betzig in 2005 when he became aware of research on fluorescent proteins that can be activated at need. Instead of using different colors to build an image, he could use proteins that were excited at different times. One year later, Betzig was able to show that his technique was practical.
Robert Eric Betzig was born on Jan. 13, 1960, in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He attended the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in physics in 1983. He then attended Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, graduating with a master’s degree in 1985 and a doctor’s degree in 1988. He went on to work at AT&T Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey. He left academic research in 1994, returning to join the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in 2005.
