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Holden Thorp was born in Fayetteville, NC in 1964 and earned a B.S. with highest honors in Chemistry from UNC in 1986. He received his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the California Institute of Technology in 1
989. In addition to his scientific pursuits, Holden is also an accomplished musician who plays jazz bass and keyboard.
Patti Worden Thorp is a native of Hope Mills, NC. Patti and Holden grew up together in the Cape Fear Regional Theatre, which Holden’s mother founded. After graduating from UNC-Greensboro with a degree in Theatre Arts, Holden followed Patti to Connecticut, where she earned a masters degree in Theatre Management at the Yale School of Drama and he was a postdoctoral associate.
In 1991, the couple returned to North Carolina and married; he became an assistant chemistry professor at NC State University. In 1993, the pair went to UNC, he on faculty of the chemistry department, she in the department of dramatic art with the PlayMakers Repertory Company. In 1997, Patti left UNC to work with the Raleigh Little Theatre and, since 1999, has stayed home to care for their two children – John, 14 and Emma, 10.
From 2001 to 2005, Holden directed the Morehead Planetarium and Science Center, guiding efforts to expand the planetarium's original emphasis to become a comprehensive science education center for North Carolina. In 2007 he was named dean of UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences and, on July 1, 2008, Holden became the 10th chancellor of the University of North Carolina.
Holden has published more than 130 scholarly articles on the electronic properties of DNA and RNA. He invented technology for electronic DNA chips that is the basis of 19 issued or pending U.S. patents. One invention provides a less expensive blood test to determine if prospective parents carry the cystic fibrosis gene. For his DNA chip technology, Holden was recognized as one of the Top Innovators of 2001 by Fortune Small Business magazine. He also has been adviser, co-founder or consultant with many small companies, including Novalon Pharmaceuticals, MaxCyte, Osmetech, OhmX and Plextronics. In 2005, Holden co-founded Viamet Pharmaceuticals Inc., a biotechnology company targeting metalloenzymes in the fields of infectious disease, inflammation and oncology.
Holden has received many other honors for his research, including the National Science Foundation's Presidential Young Investigator Award, an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, the David and Lucile Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, and both the New Faculty Award and Teacher-Scholar Award from the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation. At Carolina, Holden has won the Tanner Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, the Ruth and Philip Hettleman Prize for Artistic and Scholarly Achievement, and the General Alumni Association's Distinguished Young Alumnus Award. In 2002, he was named an honorary member of the Order of the Golden Fleece, the campus' oldest honorary society.
