Editing Roderick MacKinnon (section)

===Career===
In 1989 he was appointed assistant professor at [[Harvard University]]<ref>{{Cite web|title=The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2003|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2003/mackinnon/biographical/|access-date=2020-08-04|website=NobelPrize.org|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Laureate – Roderick MacKinnon|url=https://www.mediatheque.lindau-nobel.org/laureates/mackinnon|access-date=2020-08-04|website=Lindau Nobel Mediatheque|language=en}}</ref> where he studied the interaction of the [[potassium channel]] with a specific toxin derived from scorpion venom, acquainting himself with methods of protein purification and [[X-ray crystallography]]. In 1996 he moved to [[Rockefeller University]] as a professor and head of the Laboratory of Molecular Neurobiology and Biophysics where he started to work on the structure of the potassium channel. These channels are of particular importance to the [[nervous system]] and the heart and enable potassium ions to cross the [[cell membrane]].