Jennie Smoly Caruthers was accomplished research scientist

BOULDER — Biochemist Marv Caruthers’ vision is now reality as University of Colorado-Boulder faculty members move into the new Jennie Smoly Caruthers Biotechnology Building named after his late wife.

Jennie Smoly Caruthers was a Ph.D. scientist and researcher. She died Jan. 8, 2006, of cancer.

She received a doctorate in biochemistry from McGill University in Montreal by the age of 23. She then joined the Enzyme Institute at the University of Wisconsin as an assistant research professor, where she met Marv Caruthers.

Caruthers met his wife one evening when he took a break from his lab to buy a Coke from a vending machine downstairs. He loaned her a nickel to cover the cost of her Coke, since she didn’t have the correct change.

Caruthers said it was the best investment he ever made. The two were married Oct. 9, 1971 in Wisconsin. The couple moved to Boulder in 1973.

Jennie Smoly Caruthers’ career included working as a principal associate in neurology at the Harvard Medical School and as a senior research associate working on bladder cancer research in the molecular, cellular and developmental biology department at CU-Boulder. She published numerous manuscripts in scientific journals.

Later in her career, Caruthers worked as a patent agent with a specialty in biotechnology at the Boulder law firm now known as Greenlee Sullivan PC. She also served on several community boards in Boulder and the region, including the board of trustees at the Boulder Community Hospital Foundation and on the Science and Technology Advisory Council of former Colorado Gov. Richard Lamm.

Marv Caruthers donated $20 million to the university in 2007 in his wife’s name. The gift is one of the largest the university has received, and the largest given to CU-Boulder by a faculty member.

Marv Caruthers was a co-founder of Amgen Inc. and a founder and investor of several other Boulder biotech companies. Now based in Thousand Oaks, California, Amgen is the largest biotechnology company in the world, and employs about 700 people at facilities in Boulder and Longmont.

Caruthers is known for designing techniques to build DNA and RNA – the molecules of heredity in the human body. He received a National Medal of Science from the White House in 2007 for his work

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