Colleagues: Wiley Unlikely Target For Bioterrorists

As the search for a missing Harvard biophysics professor continues into its 11th day, Don C. Wiley’s colleagues say that, although the case has aroused the attention of federal investigators, his work is unlikely to be of interest to bioterrorists.

The FBI said Friday that it is monitoring local efforts due to the professor’s work with rare infectious diseases. The bureau is keeping an eye on the case because of Wiley’s expertise “given the state of affairs post-Sept. 11,” FBI agent William Woerner in Memphis, Tenn. told The Boston Globe.

But Higgins Professor of Biochemistry Jack L. Strominger ’46, who won the Japan Prize in 1999 along with Wiley for progress in understanding the human immune system, said yesterday that though Wiley worked on proteins that had been obtained from dangerous viruses, he didn’t actually produce the viruses.

“It’s a misunderstanding to believe that he would be involved in any work that would be interesting to the FBI or terrorists,” Strominger said. “He had nothing to do with live viruses.”

Other colleagues also said yesterday that it was highly unlikely that Wiley, Harvard’s Loeb professor of biochemistry and biophysics, could have been kidnapped by bioterrorists.

“He wasn’t working with the Ebola virus in his lab,” said Gregory L. Verdine, a professor of chemistry. “You could think of 100 other people whom it would make more sense [for bioterrorists] to kidnap.”

Verdine pointed out that the FBI is “monitoring” the investigation—and not launching its own efforts.

“It seems to me it must not be a terribly high level of interest or else [the FBI] would mount an investigation of their own,” Verdine said.

Strominger and Verdine both emphasize that Wiley’s work has focused on isolated proteins from viruses such as Ebola and HIV—but the professor did not grow live strains in his lab.

“He worked on a protein from Ebola viruses—he didn’t grow the virus,” Strominger said.

Furthermore, due to Ebola’s structure, it would be very difficult to make a biological weapon of the virus, Verdine said.

Wiley’s wife, Karen Valgeirsdottir, has said that she thinks his disappearance was unrelated to his work since most of it was freely available.

“That just doesn’t seem plausible,” she said.

Lieutenant Joe Scott of the Memphis Police Homicide Department, which is investigating the case, said yesterday there is still a chance that Wiley could be found.

“There’s always a chance, we’re not giving up,” he said.

While ruling out the possibility that bioterrorists had kidnapped his colleague and friend, Verdine kept a hopeful tone.

“I just hope that there’s an explanation for his disappearance that keeps him with us,” Verdine said.

The Memphis police and the FBI have not yet ruled out the possibility of suicide.

Wiley, 57, was last seen in Memphis at the annual meeting of the Scientific Advisory Board of the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital just after midnight on Friday, Nov. 16. His car was found with a full fuel tank and the key in the ignition on a bridge over the Mississippi River at 4 a.m. that morning.

—Material from the Associated Press was used in the compilation of this report.