5 Scientists who contributed to genetics

Gregor Mandel

The theories of heredity attributed to Gregor Mendel, based on his work with pea plants, are well known to students of biology. But his work was so brilliant and unprecedented at the time it appeared that it took thirty-four years for the rest of the scientific community to catch up to it. The short monograph,Experiments with Plant Hybrids, in which Mendel described how traits were inherited, has become one of the most enduring and influential publications in the history of science.

Mendel, the first person to trace the characteristics of successive generations of a living thing, was not a world-renowned scientist of his day. Rather, he was an Augustinian monk who taught natural science to high school students. He was the second child of Anton and Rosine Mendel, farmers in Brunn, Moravia. Mendel's brilliant performance at school as a youngster encouraged his family to support his pursuit of a higher education, but their resources were limited, so Mendel entered an Augustinian monastery, continuing his education and starting his teaching career.

Rosalid Franklin

Rosalind Franklin was born in London on July 25, 1920. In 1947, Franklin went to the Central Government Laboratory for Chemistry in Paris where she worked on X-ray diffraction. In 1951, she moved to King's College, London.Franklin worked on a DNA project that she thought was her own. When the laboratory's second-in-command, Maurice Wilkins, returned from a vacation, however, she learned that he expected her to be his assistant rather than a colleague working as an equal. They had an uneasy relationship, complicated by the fact she was a woman in a "man's world" and their conflicting personalities. Franklin made a number of advances in x-ray diffraction techniques with DNA that allowed her to discover crucial elements in what had become a race between competing research teams to discover the structure of DNA. Franklin produced X-ray diffraction pictures of DNA which were published in Nature in April 1953. This played an important role in establishing the structure of DNA. In fact, many scientists believe Franklin played a larger role than previously acknowledged in the research that led to the 1962 Nobel Prize that was awarded to Maruice Wilkins, Francis Crick, and James Watson for the discovery of DNA's double helix.


F.Sanger

Frederick Sanger(born 13 August 1918) is an English biochemist and a two-time Nobel laureate in chemistry, the only person to have been so. In 1958 he was awarded a Nobel prize in chemistry "for his work on the structure of proteins, especially that of insulin". In 1980, Walter Gilbert and Sanger shared half of the chemistry prize "for their contributions concerning the determination of base sequences in nucleic acids". The other half was awarded to Paul Berg "for his fundamental studies of the biochemistry of nucleic acids, with particular regard to recombinant-DNA".He is the fourth (and only living) person to have been awarded two Nobel Prizes, either individually or in tandem with others.

Paul Berg

Molecular biologist who in 1972 created the first recombinant DNA molecules, and, in doing so, created the field of genetic engineering.

Berg, born in Brooklyn, New York, attended Case Western Reserve University, and in 1952, obtained a Ph. D. in biochemistry. He became a Stanford professor in 1959. Berg, in 1972, combined DNA from the cancer-causing monkey virus SV40 with that of the virus lambda to create the first recombinant DNA molecules. However, upon realizing the dangers of his experiment, terminated it before it could be taken any further. He immediately, in what is now called the "Berg Letter," proposed a one year moratorium on recombinant DNA research, in order for safety concerns to be worked out. Berg later continued his recombinant DNA research, and was awarded the 1980 Nobel Prize in chemistry. In 1991, Berg accepted a position as the head of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Human Genome Project.

J.Craig Venter

J. Craig Venter, Ph.D., is regarded as one of the leading scientists of the 21st century for his numerous invaluable contributions to genomic research. He is Founder, Chairman, and President of the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), a not-for-profit, research organization with approximately 300 scientists and staff dedicated to human, microbial, plant, synthetic and environmental genomic research, and the exploration of social and ethical issues in genomics.

Dr. Venter is also Founder and CEO of Synthetic Genomics Inc., a privately held company dedicated to commercializing genomic-driven solutions to address global needs such as new sources of energy, new food and nutritional products, and next generation vaccines.