DOCSLIB.ORG

Chemical Reaction Kinetics Is Back: Attempts to Deal with Complexity in Biology

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Chemical Reaction Kinetics Is Back: Attempts to Deal with Complexity in Biology Chemical Reaction Kinetics Is Back: Attempts to Deal with Complexity in Biology Developing a Quantitative Molecular View to Understanding Life ew strategies to handle complexity in biology have been and are developed under the catch phrase “systems biology.” What stands in the core of this PETER SCHUSTER N recent field of research is the concept to understand and model cells and organisms as high-dimensional dynamical systems and to determine the necessary input parameters by experiment. Regulation of gene activities and metabolic func- tions are encapsulated in differential equations that have their origin in chemical Peter Schuster is Professor of reaction kinetics. Needless to say, this ap- Theoretical Chemistry at Vienna proach has to envisage enormous com- University. His publications, about 300 Over many decades, molecular plexity. On the other hand, solution of papers and nine books, deal with the biology has been extraordinarily analysis and prediction of molecular large numbers of kinetic equations, up to successful in applying a one thousand and more commonly structures from small molecules to qualitative molecular view to biopolymers and the dynamics of rather stiff equations, is routine in com- evolutionary processes. The books understanding life. bustion chemistry and flame modeling. include “The Hydrogen Bond”, three What’s new, however, is the fact that cel- collective volumes together with Georg lular reaction networks have a number of Zundel and Camille Sandorfy; “The unique properties unknown in physics and chemistry. They are not only self- Hypercycle—A Principle of Natural Self-Organization” together with regulated but they are also capable of reproduction, they are robust and don’t Manfred Eigen; and “Evolutionary change their state under often not so small changes in the environment, and they can Dynamics—Exploring the Interplay of tolerate loss of one or the other constituent without loosing function. Both the Selection, Accident, Neutrality, and experimental [1] and the computational approach to systems biology [2, 3] have Function”, a collective volume together made substantial progress within the last few years. Somehow, the mathematical with James P. Crutchfield. His recent analysis of the basic properties of genetic and metabolic networks is lagging behind research focuses on optimization of RNA structures as a model for [4, 5]. Despite undoubted success [6], many fundamental questions are still unan- molecular evolution and the role of swered. selectively neutral variants. Peter Over many decades, molecular biology has been extraordinarily successful in Schuster is at the Institu¨t fu¨r applying a qualitative molecular view to understanding life. This qualitative image of Theoretische Chemie und Moleculare nature is based on yes-or-no answers rather than the conventional quantitative Strukturbiologie der Universita¨t Wien, Waeringerstraße 17, A-1090 Wien, Austria. Correspondence to: Peter Schuster, E-mail: [email protected] 14 COMPLEXITY © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc., Vol. 10, No. 1 DOI 10.1002/cplx.20056 description applied in physics and struction of raw images come to an end chemistry. It uses rough pictures re- [8]? Has the period of gathering facts Enormously complex regulation placing the commonly very fine details reached the limits because the volume networks, rather than simple of molecular structures. Function is il- and the diversity of data escape the cascades, are formed by gene lustrated by means of cartoons rather imaginative power of the human brain? interaction and a new kind of than equations. This was not always so. I don’t think so, but the current mass network theory that allows for Until the 1970s, biochemical kinetics production of experimental data indeed asking the appropriate questions, was central to the research in molecular provides new and hitherto unknown is required. biosciences and explored cooperative challenges: How are databases created processes, such as allosterically induced that allow for fast and unambiguous re- conformational changes of biopoly- trieval and provide convenient tools for active structural or housekeeping genes mers, and the mechanisms of enzyme comparison of information from very and about the same number of specific regulatory genes that define the state of reactions. Within the last three decades different sources? The conventional the cell and its role within the organ to of the twentieth century, however, techniques of data processing work fine which it belongs. All this is executed by mathematics and quantitative thinking with precisely defined objects, for ex- means of a complex network, inter- were largely banned from molecular bi- ample, sequences and structures at weaving gene activities in subtle man- ology. I’ve heard hard-nosed professors atomic resolution. Gene expression ner. The problem is to cut, or better yet, of molecular biology at European uni- data from microarrays are different in to release this Gordian knot. versities saying, “Molecular biology as I this respect because they have an indis- Chemical reaction kinetics such as understand it, is qualitative in nature!” pensable quantitative component that combustion or polymerization have Let me take, for a moment, the position is poorly reflected by a yes-no-maybe plenty of experience with high-dimen- of devil’s advocate: Molecular genetics, sional ordinary or partial differential one might well say, is even in a pre- equations. On the other hand, non- Linnaean state because there is no sign Gene expression data from linear chemical systems have been for the beginning of the development of microarrays are different in this respect because they have an investigatedingreatdetail[9].Beingauto- a systematic and generally accepted no- indispensable quantitative catalytic processes, these multistep re- menclature of genes and gene products. component that is poorly actions represent excellent examples of Instead, molecular biologists continue reflected by a yes-no-maybe multiple steady states, oscillations, de- to name the genes they’ve discovered, classification. terministic chaos, and spatial pattern after the entries in their laboratory formation. The way from the relatively notebooks, or, they use more or less simple nonlinear chemical model sys- arbitrary names taken from various classification. Theory is required to tems to the characterization of the sources. I am not denying that there are bring order into the more complex states of cells by means of attractors is serious attempts toward a more system- “heaps of facts” before they can be pro- elaborate and hard to go into detail, but atical nomenclature, but they have not cessed efficiently by computer tech- it is straightforward. Complex chemical (yet) made it into daily laboratory work. niques. The really fundamental prob- reactions can also be a suitable study Starting in the mid-1990s, biologists be- lem, however, arises from the numbers model for the development of novel re- gan to feel the lack of comprehensive of genes, which lie between a few thou- verse engineering tools [10] for the theory and quantitative thinking. As Sir sand in bacteria and some 30,000 in study of biological complexity. Perhaps Peter Medawar had already said a de- humans, and the nature of their inter- engineering theory is a good method for cade earlier, “No new principle has de- actions: Enormously complex regula- providing insight into the interplay be- clared itself from below a heap of facts.” tion networks, rather than simple cas- tween resilience, robustness, modular- Even the pioneer of molecular biolo- cades, are formed by gene interaction ity, and hierarchical control in biologi- gists and Nobel laureate, Sidney Bren- and a new kind of network theory that cal systems. Because most of the kinetic ner, urged the development of a novel allows for asking the appropriate ques- rate parameters of cellular processes are quantitative and comprehensive theo- tions, is required. For a moment, let us unknown and their determination retical biology in an interview that he imagine the complexity of a mamma- through measurements is difficult, ex- gave for the German magazine Labor- lian cell: 30,000 genes have the potential pensive, and often almost impossible, journal. [7]. to produce the same number of gene the solution of the inverse mathemati- Why are the biologists now calling products, but, in every cell the majority cal problem of reaction kinetics consist- for the return of quantitative aspects? of gene activities have to be down reg- ing of the determination of parameters Have qualitative thinking and the con- ulated to leave us with a few thousand from measured data is a great challenge © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. COMPLEXITY 15 (The forward problem is the computa- computer science, physics, electrical en- date education of biology students. Uni- tion of solution curves from rate param- gineering, and chemistry, into modern versity curricula have to be adapted to eters and initial conditions). biology. In reality, to achieve in such a these new developments. Fortunately, It is already commonplace to say that great synthesis toward the life sciences of this fact has already been appreciated understanding complexity in biology and the future is a different story, but inter- and has reached current awareness in the in other disciplines will not be possible disciplinary research is no longer placed United States [11, 12] and in other coun- without a joint effort integrating experi- at the side-table of funding agencies. The tries. With very few exceptions, however, ence from many branches of science reorientation of molecular life sciences the universities in continental Europe are and engineering, including mathematics, has clear-cut consequences for an up-to- still lagging behind. REFERENCES 1. Tewari, M. et al. Systematic interactome mapping and genetic perturbation analysis of a C. elegans TGF-␤ signaling network. Mol Cell 2004, 13, 469–482. 2. Hasty, J.; McMillen, D.; Isaacs, F.; Collins, J.J. Computational studies of gene regulatory networks: In numero molecular biology. Nat Rev Genet 2001, 2, 268–279. 3. Kitano, H. Computational systems biology. Nature 2002, 420, 206–210. 4. Strogatz, S.H.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • A Scientist's Life for Me
    NATURE|Vol 455|16 October 2008 AUTUMN BOOKS OPINION A scientist’s life for me Forty years after the publication of James Watson’s The Double Helix, Georgina Ferry asks why the life stories of so few scientists make it into the bookshops. In 1968 Peter Medawar, Nobel prizewinner and author of many witty reflections on sci- ence and its practitioners, consented to write a preface to Ronald Clark’s biography of the influential British biologist J. B. S. Haldane. Imagine Clark’s consternation when he read its opening line: “The lives of academics, considered as Lives, almost always make dull reading.” Later, Medawar recycled the opening paragraph for an essay in his col- lection Pluto’s Republic (1982), claiming further that scientists’ lives, unlike those of “artists and men of letters”, were “not a source of cultural insight”. James Watson’s The Double Helix, a book that broke the mould of scientific life-writing, also appeared in 1968. It provided abundant ‘cultural insight’ into the combination of good contacts, brilliance, luck, hard work and ruth- less competitiveness that brought to light the DNA structure. It was panned by many of Watson’s contemporaries — if Francis Crick had got his way, the book would never have been published. Yet in his own memoir What modern laboratory Mad Pursuit (1988), Crick later admitted that life? Scientific life-writing is now publishers. Most people have he was wrong: “I now appreciate how skilful a small and shrinking enterprise. Publishers heard of very few scientists, so those that they Jim was, not only in making the book read agree that the market for scholarly biography do recognize — Isaac Newton, Charles Dar- like a detective story, but also by managing to has suffered from the onslaught of celebrity win and Albert Einstein — seem the safest bets.
    [Show full text]
  • | Sydney Brenner |
    | SYDNEY BRENNER | TOP THREE AWARDS • Nobel Prize in Physiology, 2002 • Albert Lasker Special Achievement Award, 2000 • National Order of Mapungubwe (Gold), 2004 DEFINING MOMENT To view the DNA model for the first time. 32 |LEGENDS OF SOUTH AFRICAN SCIENCE| A LIFE DEDICATED TO SCIENCE C. ELEGANS WORK In the more than eight decades that Nobel Laureate, Prof Sydney Brenner, “To start with we propose to identify every cell in the worm and trace line- has all-consumingly devoted his life to science, he twice wrote powerful age. We shall also investigate the constancy of development and study proposals of no longer than a page. Short but sweet, these kick-started the its control by looking for mutants,” is how Brenner ended his proposal on two projects that are part of his lasting legacy. Caenorhabditis elegans to the UK Medical Research Council in October 1963. He was looking for a new challenge after already having helped to The first was to request funding to study a worm, because he saw in the show that genetic code is composed of non-overlapping triplets and that nematode Caenorhabditis elegans the ideal genetic model organism. messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) exists. He was right, and received the Nobel Prize for his efforts. The other pro- posal, which set out how Singapore could become a hub for biomedical His first paper on C. elegans appeared in Genetics in 1974, and in all, the research, earned him the title of “mentor to a nation’s science ambitions”. work took about 20 years to reach its full potential.
    [Show full text]
  • UNESCO Kalinga Prize Winner – 1985 Sir Peter Brian Medawar Nobel Laureate
    Glossary on Kalinga Prize Laureates UNESCO Kalinga Prize Winner – 1985 Sir Peter Brian Medawar Nobel Laureate An Eminent British Scientist of Lebanese Origin, A Biologist and Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine – 1960 [Born : February 28, 1915, Petropolis, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Died : October 2, 1987 (aged 72) London, United Kingdom] Today the world Changes so quickly that in growing up we take leave not just of youth but of the world we were young in . I suppose we all realize the degree to which fear and resentment of what is new is really a lament for the memories of our childhood. ...Peter Medawar I can not give any scientist of any age better advice than this: the intensity of a conviction that a hypothesis is true has no bearing over whether it is true or not. …Peter Medawar If Politics is the art of the Possible, research is surely the art of the soluble. Both are immensely Practical minded affairs . ...Peter Medawar 1 Glossary on Kalinga Prize Laureates Peter Medawar A Brief Biographical Sketch Born : February 28, 1915 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Died : October 2, 1987 (aged 72) London, United Kingdom Notable Prizes : Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1960), Kalinga Prize, 1985 Sir Peter Brian Medawar (February 28, 1915 – acquired immunological tolerance. This work was October 2, 1987) was a Briazilian – born British used in dealing with skin grafts required after burns. scientist best known for his work on how the immune Medawar’s work resulted in a shift of emphasis in system rejects or accepts tissue transplants.
    [Show full text]
  • Cambridge's 92 Nobel Prize Winners Part 4 - 1996 to 2015: from Stem Cell Breakthrough to IVF
    Cambridge's 92 Nobel Prize winners part 4 - 1996 to 2015: from stem cell breakthrough to IVF By Cambridge News | Posted: February 01, 2016 Some of Cambridge's most recent Nobel winners Over the last four weeks the News has been rounding up all of Cambridge's 92 Nobel Laureates, which this week comes right up to the present day. From the early giants of physics like JJ Thomson and Ernest Rutherford to the modern-day biochemists unlocking the secrets of our genome, we've covered the length and breadth of scientific discovery, as well as hugely influential figures in economics, literature and politics. What has stood out is the importance of collaboration; while outstanding individuals have always shone, Cambridge has consistently achieved where experts have come together to bounce their ideas off each other. Key figures like Max Perutz, Alan Hodgkin and Fred Sanger have not only won their own Nobels, but are regularly cited by future winners as their inspiration, as their students went on to push at the boundaries they established. In the final part of our feature we cover the last 20 years, when Cambridge has won an average of a Nobel Prize a year, and shows no sign of slowing down, with ground-breaking research still taking place in our midst today. The Gender Pay Gap Sale! Shop Online to get 13.9% off From 8 - 11 March, get 13.9% off 1,000s of items, it highlights the pay gap between men & women in the UK. Shop the Gender Pay Gap Sale – now. Promoted by Oxfam 1.1996 James Mirrlees, Trinity College: Prize in Economics, for studying behaviour in the absence of complete information As a schoolboy in Galloway, Scotland, Mirrlees was in line for a Cambridge scholarship, but was forced to change his plans when on the weekend of his interview he was rushed to hospital with peritonitis.
    [Show full text]
  • Illustrations from the Wellcome Institute Library the Chain Papers*
    Medical History, 1983, 27:434-435 ILLUSTRATIONS FROM THE WELLCOME INSTITUTE LIBRARY THE CHAIN PAPERS* THE three men who shared the Nobel Prize in October 1945 for their work on penicillin could scarcely have differed more in their backgrounds and characters. Fleming was sixty-four years old by then; the son of a Scottish farmer, he was a retiring man, not given to conversation. By contrast, Florey, then aged forty-seven, was the son of a wealthy Australian boot and shoe manufacturer; aggressively ambitious, his achievements and intellect were later to secure him the Presidency of the Royal Society. Then there was Chain - a mere thirty-nine years old - a Jewish refugee of Russian origin, who still had major work on penicillin ahead of him; his ambition was mixed with an independence and volubility that was to lead him into conflict with the scientific/medical establishment. Fleming has been the subject of many biographies, mostly hagiographical. Florey's role in the penicillin story was recently reassessed in Gwyn Macfarlane's excellent Howard Florey. The making ofa great scientist (Oxford University Press, 1979). Sir Ernst Boris Chain died in 1979, and his biography is being written by Ronald W. Clark. This, together with future research on Chain's papers, will enable a fuller assessment to be made of the role and character of the youngest of the three scientists. The Chain papers, recently given by Lady Chain to the Contemporary Medical Archives Centre, form an extensive collection of some sixty-nine boxes, comprising material from Chain's personal and professional life.
    [Show full text]
  • The Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London Galen Medal Winners
    The Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London Galen Medal Winners 1926 Prof WE DIXON, BSc, MA, MD, DPH, FRS Pharmacology 1927 Sir Gowland HOPKINS, MA, LLD, DSc, FRCP, FRIC, FRS Discovery of vitamins 1928 Prof JJ ABEL, MD, ScD, LLD Isolation of Adrenaline 1930 Prof E FOURNEAU, Directeur de 1'Institute Pasteur Pharmacology of amino-alcohols 1932 Sir Henry DALE, OM, GBE, MA, MD, FRCP, FRS Neurophysiology 1934 Prof Sir Frederick BANTING, MC, Hon FRCS, DSc, LLD Discovery of Insulin 1946 Sir Alexander FLEMING, FRCP, FRCS, FRS Penicillin Lord FLOREY, MA, MD, FRCP, FRS 1947 F CURD, BSc, PhD D DAVEY, MSc, PhD Discovery of Paludrine F ROSE, BSc, PhD 1948 Sir Lionel WHITBY, CVO, MC, MD, FRCP Sulphonamides 1949 Prof J TREFOUEL, Directeur de 1'Institute Pasteur Sulphonamides 1951 Prof Sir Charles DODDS, Bt, MVO, MD, FRCP, FRS Biochemistry 1953 Sir Charles HARINGTON, MA, PhD, FRS Synthesised Thyroxin 1954 EL SMITH, DSc, FRIC Vitamin B12 1955 Lord BROCK, MS, FRCS Cardiac surgery 1957 Prof Sir Ernst CHAIN, MA, DPhil, FRS Production of Penicillin 1958 Sir Macfarlane BURNET, OM, MD, FRCP, FRS Vaccines for virus infections 1959 Prof Sir Bradford HILL, CBE, PhD, DSc, FRS Medical statistics 1960 Sir Tudor THOMAS, DSc, MD, MS, FRCS Corneo-plastic surgery 1961 Prof R PATERSON, CBE, MC, MD, FRCS, FFR Radiotherapy 1962 Prof W PENFIELD, OM, CMG, MD, DSc, FRS Neurosurgery & Neurophysiology 1963 Prof Sir Alexander HADDOW, MD, DSc, PhD, FRS Experimental pathology & cancer research 1964 FP DOYLE, MSc, FRIC Chemical & biological GN ROLINSON, BSc, PhD development
    [Show full text]
  • December 21, 2004 How to Be a Successful Scientist Paul Thagard University of Waterloo [email protected] Thagard, P. (2005)
    How to Be a Successful Scientist Paul Thagard University of Waterloo [email protected] Thagard, P. (2005). How to be a successful scientist. In M. E. Gorman, R. D. Tweney, D. C. Gooding & A. P. Kincannon (Eds.), Scientific and technological thinking (pp. 159- 171). Mawah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Introduction Studies in the history, philosophy, sociology, and psychology of science and technology have gathered much information about important cases of scientific development. These cases usually concern the most successful scientists and inventors, such as Darwin, Einstein, and Edison. But case studies rarely address the question of what made these investigators more accomplished than the legions of scientific laborers whose names have been forgotten. This chapter is an attempt to identify many of the psychological and other factors that make some scientists highly successful. I explore two sources of information about routes to scientific achievement. The first derives from a survey that Jeff Shrager conducted at the Workshop on Cognitive Studies of Science and Technology at the University of Virginia in March, 2001. He asked the participants to list “7 habits of highly creative people”, and after the workshop he and I compiled a list of habits recommended by the distinguished group of historians, philosophers, and psychologists at the workshop. My second source of information about the factors contributing to scientific success is advice given by three distinguished biologists who each won a Nobel prize: Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Peter Medawar, and James Watson. These biologists provide advice that usefully supplements the suggestions from the workshop participants. December 21, 2004 Habits of Highly Creative People When Jeff Shrager asked the workshop participants to submit suggestions for a list of “7 habits of highly creative people”, I was skeptical that they would come up with anything less trite than work hard and be smart.
    [Show full text]
  • Lasker Interactive Research Nom'18.Indd
    THE 2018 LASKER MEDICAL RESEARCH AWARDS Nomination Packet albert and mary lasker foundation November 1, 2017 Greetings: On behalf of the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation, I invite you to submit a nomination for the 2018 Lasker Medical Research Awards. Since 1945, the Lasker Awards have recognized the contributions of scientists, physicians, and public citizens who have made major advances in the understanding, diagnosis, treatment, cure, and prevention of disease. The Medical Research Awards will be offered in three categories in 2018: Basic Research, Clinical Research, and Special Achievement. The Lasker Foundation seeks nominations of outstanding scientists; nominations of women and minorities are encouraged. Nominations that have been made in previous years are not automatically reconsidered. Please see the Nomination Requirements section of this booklet for instructions on updating and resubmitting a nomination. The Foundation accepts electronic submissions. For information on submitting an electronic nomination, please visit www.laskerfoundation.org. Lasker Awards often presage future recognition of the Nobel committee, and they have become known popularly as “America’s Nobels.” Eighty-seven Lasker laureates have received the Nobel Prize, including 40 in the last three decades. Additional information on the Awards Program and on Lasker laureates can be found on our website, www.laskerfoundation.org. A distinguished panel of jurors will select the scientists to be honored with Lasker Medical Research Awards. The 2018 Awards will
    [Show full text]
  • Gerald Edelman - Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
    Gerald Edelman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Create account Log in Article Talk Read Edit View history Gerald Edelman From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Main page Gerald Maurice Edelman (born July 1, 1929) is an Contents American biologist who shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in Gerald Maurice Edelman Featured content Physiology or Medicine for work with Rodney Robert Born July 1, 1929 (age 83) Current events Porter on the immune system.[1] Edelman's Nobel Prize- Ozone Park, Queens, New York Nationality Random article winning research concerned discovery of the structure of American [2] Fields Donate to Wikipedia antibody molecules. In interviews, he has said that the immunology; neuroscience way the components of the immune system evolve over Alma Ursinus College, University of Interaction the life of the individual is analogous to the way the mater Pennsylvania School of Medicine Help components of the brain evolve in a lifetime. There is a Known for immune system About Wikipedia continuity in this way between his work on the immune system, for which he won the Nobel Prize, and his later Notable Nobel Prize in Physiology or Community portal work in neuroscience and in philosophy of mind. awards Medicine in 1972 Recent changes Contact Wikipedia Contents [hide] Toolbox 1 Education and career 2 Nobel Prize Print/export 2.1 Disulphide bonds 2.2 Molecular models of antibody structure Languages 2.3 Antibody sequencing 2.4 Topobiology 3 Theory of consciousness Беларуская 3.1 Neural Darwinism Български 4 Evolution Theory Català 5 Personal Deutsch 6 See also Español 7 References Euskara 8 Bibliography Français 9 Further reading 10 External links Hrvatski Ido Education and career [edit] Bahasa Indonesia Italiano Gerald Edelman was born in 1929 in Ozone Park, Queens, New York to Jewish parents, physician Edward Edelman, and Anna Freedman Edelman, who worked in the insurance industry.[3] After עברית Kiswahili being raised in New York, he attended college in Pennsylvania where he graduated magna cum Nederlands laude with a B.S.
    [Show full text]
  • Advertising (PDF)
    Share the wonders of the brain and mind with A PUBLIC INFORMATION INITIATIVE OF: Seeking resources to communicate with the public about neuroscience? Educating others through Brain Awareness activities? BrainFacts.org can help you communicate how the brain works. Explore BrainFacts.org for easy-to-use, accessible resources including: s Information about hundreds of diseases and disorders s Concepts about brain function s Educational tools s Multimedia tools and a social media community s Interviews and discussions with leading researchers; and more Visit BrainFacts.org Give to the Friends of SfN Fund Join us in forging the future of neuroscience Support a future of discovery and progress through travel awards and public education and outreach programs. To inquire about specific initiatives or to make a tax-deductible contribution, visit SfN.org or email: [email protected]. THE HISTORY OF NEUROSCIENCE IN AUTOBIOGRAPHY THE LIVES AND DISCOVERIES OF EMINENT SENIOR NEUROSCIENTISTS CAPTURED IN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL BOOKS AND VIDEOS The History of Neuroscience in Autobiography Series Edited by Larry R. Squire Outstanding neuroscientists tell the stories of their scientific work in this fascinating series of autobiographical essays. Within their writings, they discuss major events that shaped their discoveries and their influences, as well as people who inspired them and helped shape their careers as neuroscientists. The History of Neuroscience in Autobiography, Vol. 1 The History of Neuroscience in Autobiography, Vol. 4 Denise Albe-Fessard, Julius Axelrod, Peter O. Bishop, Per Andersen, Mary Bunge, Jan Bures, Jean-Pierre Changeux, Theodore H. Bullock, Irving T. Diamond, Robert Galambos, John Dowling, Oleh Hornykiewicz, Andrew Huxley, Jac Sue Viktor Hamburger, Sir Alan L.
    [Show full text]
  • Discovery of the Secrets of Life Timeline
    Discovery of the Secrets of Life Timeline: A Chronological Selection of Discoveries, Publications and Historical Notes Pertaining to the Development of Molecular Biology. Copyright 2010 Jeremy M. Norman. Date Discovery or Publication References Crystals of plant and animal products do not typically occur naturally. F. Lesk, Protein L. Hünefeld accidentally observes the first protein crystals— those of Structure, 36;Tanford 1840 hemoglobin—in a sample of dried menstrual blood pressed between glass & Reynolds, Nature’s plates. Hunefeld, Der Chemismus in der thierischen Organisation, Robots, 22.; Judson, Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1840, 158-63. 489 In his dissertation Louis Pasteur begins a series of “investigations into the relation between optical activity, crystalline structure, and chemical composition in organic compounds, particularly tartaric and paratartaric acids. This work focused attention on the relationship between optical activity and life, and provided much inspiration and several of the most 1847 HFN 1652; Lesk 36 important techniques for an entirely new approach to the study of chemical structure and composition. In essence, Pasteur opened the way to a consideration of the disposition of atoms in space.” (DSB) Pasteur, Thèses de Physique et de Chimie, Presentées à la Faculté des Sciences de Paris. Paris: Bachelier, 1847. Otto Funcke (1828-1879) publishes illustrations of crystalline 1853 hemoglobin of horse, humans and other species in his Atlas der G-M 684 physiologischen Chemie, Leizpig: W. Englemann, 1853. Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace publish the first exposition of the theory of natural selection. Darwin and Wallace, “On the Tendency of 1858 Species to Form Varieties, and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and G-M 219 Species by Natural Means of Selection,” J.
    [Show full text]
  • The Sui Generis Sydney Brenner,” by Thoru Pederson, Which Was First Published June 10, 2019; 10.1073/ Pnas.1907536116 (Proc
    Correction RETROSPECTIVE Correction for “The sui generis Sydney Brenner,” by Thoru Pederson, which was first published June 10, 2019; 10.1073/ pnas.1907536116 (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 116,13155–13157). The author notes that, on page 13155, left column, second paragraph, lines 13–14, “Cyril Hinshelwood at Oxford, a leading figure in the early bacteriophage field” has been revised to read “Cyril Hinshelwood at Oxford, a chemist turned bacteriologist.” Additionally, in the original version of this article, the author stated that the experiments performed by Brenner and Crick involved chemically induced mutations in given DNA letters. In fact, most of the data were from spontaneous mutations. We have removed this incorrect assertion. The online version of the article has been corrected. Published under the PNAS license. Published online July 15, 2019. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1910910116 CORRECTION www.pnas.org PNAS | July 23, 2019 | vol. 116 | no. 30 | 15307 Downloaded by guest on October 1, 2021 RETROSPECTIVE The sui generis Sydney Brenner RETROSPECTIVE Thoru Pedersona,1 Sydney Brenner died on April 5, 2019, at age 92. His fame arose from three domains in which he operated with uncommon intellectual vibrancy. First were his prescient ideas and breakthrough experiments that defined the DNA genetic code and how the informa- tion it contains is transmitted into proteins. Second, in a later career, he developed a model organism, the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans, to determine how the cells of an animal descend, one by one, along pathways of increasing specialization. Last was his be- guiling skill as an intellectual sharpshooter, often sur- prising colleagues by the immediacy of his “take” of a problem, even ones somewhat beyond his ken.
    [Show full text]