The work of Thomas R. Cech has revolutionized the way in which scientists look at RNA and at proteins, leading not only to new technologies in RNA engineering but also to a revised view of the evolution of life. Cech shared the 1989 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with Sidney Altman at Yale University for their work regarding the role of RNA in cell reactions.

Cech was born in Chicago on December 8, 1947, to Robert Franklin Cech, a physician, and Annette Marie Cerveny Cech; he grew up in Iowa City, Iowa. Cech attended Grinnell College in 1966; at first attracted to physical chemistry, he soon concentrated on biological chemistry, graduating with a chemistry degree in 1970.

Cech did his graduate studies in chemistry at the University of California at Berkeley and held a postdoctoral position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he focused on the DNA structures of the mouse genome...