Oswald Avery, DNA, and the transformation of biology

@article{Cobb2014OswaldAD,
  title={Oswald Avery, DNA, and the transformation of biology},
  author={Matthew Cobb},
  journal={Current Biology},
  year={2014},
  volume={24},
  pages={R55-R60}
}
  • M. Cobb
  • Published 20 January 2014
  • History
  • Current Biology
View on Elsevier
cell.com
16 Citations
Background Citations
5
Results Citations
1

Figures from this paper

16 Citations

Citation Type

Citation Type

A Speculative History of DNA: What If Oswald Avery Had Died in 1934?
This speculative Essay explores the consequences of the imagined premature death of Oswald Avery, who in 1944 provided evidence that genes are made of DNA. Four imaginary alternate routes to the…
Who discovered messenger RNA?
  • M. Cobb
  • Education
    Current Biology
  • 2015
The History of Microbiology-A Personal Interpretation.
  • R. Kolter
  • Biology
    Annual review of microbiology
  • 2021
TLDR
The vision for the future is that the study of the fundamental roles of microbes in ecology and evolution will lead to an integrated biology with no boundary between microbiology and macrobiology.
Impact of Nucleic Acid Sequencing on Viroid Biology
The early 1970s marked two breakthroughs in the field of biology: (i) The development of nucleotide sequencing technology; and, (ii) the discovery of the viroids. The first DNA sequences were…
DNA as a target for lanthanide(III) complexes influence
Drawing on the Past to Shape the Future of Synthetic Yeast Research
TLDR
A history of yeast research is reflected on to indicate the potential that arises from advances in science, and how this can contribute to the ongoing recovery and development of human society.
Horizontally Acquired Genes Are Often Shared between Closely Related Bacterial Species
TLDR
This work uses a pangenome-based approach to identify genes that were horizontally acquired by four closely related bacterial species, belonging to the Enterobacteriaceae family, and finds that a high percent of horizontally acquired genes are shared among these closely related species.
Progress in Drug Discovery & Biomedical Science
TLDR
This review aims to summarize the various mechanisms and functions in living organisms believed to utilize quantum mechanics to purposefully and effectively enhance their performance, and to explore the potential this could hold in diagnosing and treating various medical conditions.
What Is Habitus?
The history of anthropology has made a tradition of studying the body. Among those early scholars who gifted us with fundamental ideas was Marcel Mauss. In the 1920s, Mauss’s students at the…
Liposome–ligand conjugates: a review on the current state of art
TLDR
Various strategies for the functionalisation of liposome as well as the different types of ligand–liposome conjugates have been discussed and the pros and cons of conjugation in liposomes are concisely summarised.
...
...

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 58 REFERENCES
The transformation of genetics by DNA: an anniversary celebration of Avery, MacLeod and McCarty (1944).
In this article, Lederberg marked the fiftieth anniversary of the 1944 paper by Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty and the opening of the field of genetics.
Early responses to Avery et al.'s paper on DNA as hereditary material
TLDR
The responses to Avery9s et al.9s paper show how different research interests in the areas between microbiology, genetics, and biochemistry interacted with the prejudices, dogmas, individual farsightedness or short-sightedness, and scientific authority during a pivotal period of early molecular biology.
Transformation of Cells and Viruses
TLDR
Both the first and the second concerning a novel system of relations between the nucleus and cytoplasmic substances in heredity are of considerable potential significance for the study of differentiation and growth.
The Professor, the Institute, and DNA
RENA J. DUBOS, The Professor, the Institute, and DNA, New York, Rockefeller University Press, 1976, 8vo, pp. vii, 238, illus., $14.50. Oswald Theodore Avery (1877-1955), nicknamed "The Professor",…
The Transforming Principle : Discovering that genes are made ofDNA
TLDR
This was the dawn of molecular genetics, the first clear demonstration that genetic specificity was inscribed in the chemical structure of DNA.
Functional differentiation within particles of bacteriophage T2.
  • A. D. Hershey
  • Biology
    Cold Spring Harbor symposia on quantitative biology
  • 1953
TLDR
Some of the reasons for the current interest in the DNA of T2 are reviewed, and unfortunately I shall not be able to say anything of consequence about its function.
The chemical characterization of the gene: vicissitudes of evidential assessment.
  • J. Stegenga
  • Psychology
    History and philosophy of the life sciences
  • 2011
TLDR
It is argued that the changing context in which the evidence presented by Avery's group was interpreted partly explains the vicissitudes of the assessments of the evidence.
The Transforming Principle: Discovering that Genes Are Made of DNA
"The most interesting and portentous biological experiment of the 20th century authoritatively described by one of the three principal executants." Sir Peter Medawar "The education of the…
Prematurity and uniqueness in scientific discovery.
William Astbury and the biological significance of nucleic acids, 1938-1951.
  • Kersten Hall
  • Physics
    Studies in history and philosophy of biological and biomedical sciences
  • 2011
...
...