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Friedrich Miescher
Miescher was an excellent student, he attended the university of Tabingen. His lab was of the first. He researched white blood cells and In 1869 he discovered that nuclein was made up of Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, and Phosphorus.He experimented and isolated a new molecule called nuclein.He was able to isolate nuclein from other cells and later used salmon sperm (as opposed to pus) as a source, and concluded that nuclein was made up hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, and Phosphorus. -
Period: to
The Discovery of DNA
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Frederick Griffith
Frederick Griffith was a Bacteriologists( a scientist who studies bacteria). In 1928 he discovered that bacteria can change through transformation. His discovery was huge and scientist described it as "exploding a bombshell in the field of pneumococcal ".Griffith used two strains of pneumococcus (Streptococcus pneumonia) bacteria which infect mice to conclude that bacteria can change through transformation. -
Oswald Avery, Maclyn McCarty, Colin McCleod
Oswald Avery went to Colgate university and after graduating he accepted a research position at the Rockefeller institute hospital along with McCarthy, and McCleod.In 1944 they discovered that DNA carries a cells generic materials and information. -
Linus Pauling
He became known as the founder of molecular biology due to his discovery which he deduced rules of interpreting X-ray diffraction, allowing him to figure out the shape of proteins leading to the discovery of the Double Helix. He concluded there is a difference in a gene of two types of protein. -
Erwin Chargaff
He discovered two rules that helped lead to the discovery of DNA's double helix structure. The first was that the amount of thymine and adenine are identical, as well a the amounts of cytosine and guanine. The second is that the DNA belonging to different species differs in its amount of adenine and guanine. He received the National Medal of Science for Biological Sciences in 1975. -
Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins
Rosalind was an English chemist and X-ray crystallographer who made contributions to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, coal, and graphite.Her contributions of the discovery of the structure of DNA were greatly recognized and help lead to the discovery of the Double Helix. In 1962 Maurice Wilkins won the Noble Peace prize because of his help with the discovery -
Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase
In 1952 Alfred Hershey and his assistant Martha Chase confirmed that DNA is generic material and carried generic information and was not a protein, and satisfies the first property of hereditary molecule.. Most scientists didn't know about this until they discovered it. This was a very famous experiment and named the "bender". After discovering this Alfred revived the Nobel Peace Prize in 1969. -
James Watson and Frances Crick
They determined that the structure of DNA was a double-helix polymer that contained long chains of nucleotides. They discovered that DNA replicates itself by separating into individual strands that become the template for a new double helix. The two had a fall out after Crick felt misrepresented in Watson's book. -
Matthew Meselson and Franklin Stahl
They confirmed Watson and Crick's DNA structure of a double helix. Their experiment shows and explains how DNA is replicated. They modified molecules so they had different densities and seperated. The experiment was highly regarded for its simplicity and conciseness. -
Paul Berg
He conducted an experiment in which he spliced a bit of the DNA of a bacterial virus into another, that also occurs in the closed loops. He cut each loop with an enzyme, modified them by another two enzymes (developed by his Stanford colleagues), and then the two types of DNA were mixed together until rejoined. It resulted in the first man-made recombinant DNA (rDNA). His Nobel Prize was shared with Walter Gilbert and Frederick Sanger. -
Frederick Sanger
He published a sequencing procedure using DNA polymerase with radiolabelled nucleotides. He called it the "Plus and Minus" technique. The procedure could sequence up to 80 nucleotides in one go. His group could sequence most of the nucleotides of the single-stranded bacteriophage. It was the first fully sequenced DNA-based genome. They also discovered that the coding regions of some genes overlapped with another. He won two Nobel Prizes. -
Barbara McClintock
Via studying maize, she identified two new dominant and interacting genetic loci that she named Dissociation (Ds) and Activator (Ac). She discovered that both Ds and Ac could transpose, or change position, on the chromosome. She referred to Ds and Ac as "controlling elements". She hypothesized that gene regulation could explain how complex multicellular organisms made of cells with identical genomes have cells of different function. She won a Nobel Prize. -
Kary Mullis
He invented the polymerase chain reaction (DCR) that amplifies specific DNA sequences from very small amounts of genetic material. It allows scientists to produce an almost unlimited amount of highly purified DNA molecules. It also has a widespread application including forensic science, gene sequencing, medical diagnostics, and more. Mullis won a Nobel Prize in 1993. -
J. Craig Venter
He led the first draft sequence of the human genome and assembled the first team to transfect a cell with a synthetic chromosome He and a team completed Venter's own DNA sequence. He founded the J. Craig Venter Institute, in which he is CEO.