Wiley: a possible Nobel candidate. Credit: J. CHASE/HARVARD NEWS OFFICE

Structural biologists are in shock following the disappearance of Don Wiley, one of the leading figures in the field. As Nature went to press, more than a week after Wiley's car was found abandoned near Memphis on a bridge over the Mississippi river, the FBI was still investigating.

A professor of biochemistry and biophysics at Harvard University, Wiley has been seen as a candidate for a Nobel prize. He won a 1995 Lasker award for his resolution of the structure of the two classes of major histocompatibility proteins. These proteins bind to foreign proteins, alerting the immune system to mount a response. Wiley's work opened up new vistas in immunology.

His other key work has been on the haemagglutinin protein of the influenza virus. Wiley's analyses led to the understanding of how the virus fuses with host-cell membranes. His further work on other viruses suggests the mechanism may be general.

Wiley was last seen leaving a dinner following a meeting of the scientific advisory board of St Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, where he is said to have been in good spirits.