Molecular Biology/Milestones

Milestones

Friedrich Miescher, 1869 identified Nuclein from pus cells.

Feulgan, 1927-28 demonstrated two types of Nucleic acids, i.e. DNA and RNA.

Frederick Grifith, 1928 demonstrated genetic transformation principle.

Erwin Chargaff, 1940, showed quantitative equivalence of total purine to total pyrimidines, i.e. A=T, G=C and A+T = G+C,

Oswald Avery, Colin McLeod and MacLean McCarty, 1944, demonstrated experimentally that DNA as the genetic material, they used Pneumococcus virulence and nonvirulent strains.

Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase, 1952, ultimate demonstration of DNA as the genetic material, using radioisotope labeled T2 phages.

James Watson and Francis Crick, 1952-53, a crowning achievement in proposing a 3-D model of DNA, a double helix. Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins provided x-ray diffraction data. Jerry Donahue an office mate of J.D.Watson provided the clue about the correct base tautomeric states.

George Beadle, Joshua Lederberg, Edward L.Tatum, 1958, for work on gene expression, in Neurospora, in medicine and Physiology.

Frederick Sanger, 1958, in chemistry for his work on primary structure of proteins; amino acid sequence of Insulin.

Arthur Korenberg, 1959, did in vitro synthesis of DNA using DNA polymerase, which is now called DNA polymerase-I. Severo Ochoa did an excellent job on RNA polymerases; also he worked on in initiation of translation in eukaryotes. Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology.

F. MacFarlane and Peter B. Medawar, 1960, for their excellent work on clonal selection theory of Antibody formation; Nobel Prize in Medicine and physiology.

Maramur Dotty, 1961 conducted historical DNA-DNA and DNA-RNA hybridization experiments.

Melvin Calvin, 1961, Nobel Prize in chemistry for his work on Biochemistry of carbon fixation,

Werner Arber, 1962, showed evidence for restriction enzymes; Nathan and H.Smith showed that restriction enzymes cut DNA in sequence specific manner; Nobel Prize in chemistry.

F.C. Crick. J.D.Watson and M.H.F. Wilkins, 1962 awarded Nobel Prize in medicine and Physiology, for their work on 3-D structure of DNA.

John Kendrew, Max F. Perutz, 1962, for their great work on 3-D structure of globular proteins, awarded Nobel Prize in chemistry.

John C. Eccles, Alan L.Hodkin and Andrew F. Huxley, 1963, awarded Nobel Prize in medicine and Physiology for their work on ionic basis of nerve membrane potentials.

Dorothy L.Hodkin, 1964, awarded Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work in structure of complex organic molecules.

Francois Jacob, Andre M. Lwoff, and Jacques Monod, 1965, awarded Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for their excellent work on bacterial operons, Lac-operon, and mRNAs.

Peyton Rous, 1966, for the discovery of Rous sarcoma virus, awarded Nobel Prize for this pioneering discovery of retroviruses.

Marshal Nierenberg, Severo Ochoa and Har Gobind Khorana, 1966, elucidated genetic code; H.G Khorana synthesized alanine tRNA, he also deciphered and decoded genetic code dictionary by filter based assays.

Esther Gillert, 1967, discovered DNA ligase.

H. Gobind Khorona, Marshal W. Nierenberg and Robert W. Holley, 1968, awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology, for their path breaking work in elucidating Genetic code and tRNA structure. H.G Khorona elucidated the genetic code dictionary, by filter paper assays and also responsible for the synthesis of first gene in test tube. M.W Nierenberg was the first to elucidate the meaning of the first codon UUU means Phenylalanine. Robert W. Holley elucidated the structure of ala tRNA and proposed clover leaf model.

Max Delbruck, Alfred D.Hershey, Salvador E.Luria, 1969, awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on genetics and structure of viruses.

Bernard Katz, Ulf S Voneuler, 1970, awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their extraordinary work on Biochemistry of Nerve impulse propagation and transmission.

Luis F. Leloir, 1970, awarded Nobel Prize in Chemistry, for his work on the role of nucleotides in carbohydrate synthesis.

Earl Sutherland, 1971, Nobel Prize in Medicine and physiology for their work on the mechanism of hormone action and cyclic AMP.

Gerald Edelman, Rodney R. Porter, 1972, awarded Nobel Prize in medicine for their work on the structure of Immunoglobulins.

Christian B. Anfinsen, 1972, awarded Nobel Prize for his work on relationship between primary and tertiary structures of proteins.

Albert Claude, Christian de Duve, and George E. Palade, 1974 awarded Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology, for their work on internal structure of cells.

Richard Dickerson, 1974 did x-ray diffraction of synthesized oligos of CGCGAATTTCGCG for –B- DNA; GGCCGGCC, GGTATACC for A-DNA and CGCGCG sequences are used for Z-DNA.

David Baltimore, Renato Dulbecco and Howard M. Temin, 1975, awarded Nobel Prize for their work on Reverse transcriptase and tumor causing viral activities.

Ed Southern, 1975, Southern developed Southern blotting technique.

Sanger & Barrel, and Maxam & Walter Gilbert, 1975-75, devised techniques for DNA sequencing.

D. Carleton Gajdusek, 1976, awarded Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for his work on Prion based diseases.

Herb Boyer, Stanley Cohen and Paul Berg, 1977-78, conducted DNA cloning experiments.

Werner Arber, Daniel Nathan and Hamilton Smith, 1978, awarded Nobel Prize for their work on restriction endonuclease technology.

Peter Mitchell, 1978, awarded Nobel Prize for his work on chemiosmotic mechanism in oxidative or photophosphorylation.

Paul Berg, Walter Gilbert, Frederick Sanger, 1980, awarded Nobel Prize in chemistry for their work on Recombinant DNA technology, DNA sequencing.

Baruj Bennacerraf, Jean Dausset, and George D.Snell, 1980, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology, for their work on Major Histocompatibility complex.

Palmitter and Ralph Brienster, 1981-82, produced transgenic mice with human growth hormone gene.

Aaron Klug, 1982, Nobel Prize in chemistry, for his work on structure of Nucleic acid and Protein complex.

Barbara McClintock, 1983, Nobel Prize in medicine and Physiology for her work on mobile elements in genome especially in corn plants, her work at that time was ahead of her times, a Botanist par excellence.

George Kohler, Cesar Milstein, and Neils K. Jerne, 1984, Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for their work on monoclonal antibodies.

Michael S. Brown and Joseph L.Goldstein, 1985, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on regulation of cholesterol metabolism and endocytosis.

Kary Mullis et. al.,, 1985, conducted the first PCR experiments.

Rita Levi-Montalcini and Stanley Cohen, 1986, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on neuronal growth factors.

Susumu Tonegawa, 1987, Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for the work on DNA rearrangement responsible for generating diverse antibodies.

Joahan Deisenhofer, Robert Huber and Hartmut Michel, 1988, Nobel Prize in chemistry, for their work on bacterial photosynthetic reaction center.

J. Michael Bishop, Harold Varmus, 1989, Nobel Prize chemistry, for their work on Oncogenes, that is cellular genes causing cancer or causing malignant transformation.

Thomas R. Cech, Sidney Altman, 1989, Nobel Prize in chemistry for their work on RNA as enzymes or work on Ribozymes.

Erwin Neher and Bert Sakmann, 1991, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on measurement of ion flux by patch and clamp recording.

Edmond Fischer and Edwin Krebs, 1992, Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for their work on alteration of enzyme activity by phosphorylation and dephosphorylation.

Kary Mullis and Michael Smith, 1993, Nobel Prize in chemistry for their pioneering work on polymerase chain reaction (PCR) experiments and site directed mutagenesis (SDM).

Rich Roberts and Phillip Sharp, 1993, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on split genes and RNA processing or RNA splicing.

Alfred Gilman and Martin Rodbell, 1994, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on structure and function of GTP-binding (G) proteins.

Edward B. Lewis, Christiane Nusslein-Volhard and Eric Wieschaus, 1995, Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for their work on genetic control of embryonic development.

Jens C.Skou, Paul Boyer and John Walker, 1996, Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work Na+/K+- ATPase and the mechanism of ATP synthesis.

Rolf M. Zinkernagel and Peter C. Doherty, 1997, Nobel Prize for their work on recognition of viral infected cell by immune system.