• DOI:10.1353/PBM.1969.0002
• Corpus ID: 39988917

Oswald Theodore Avery and DNA

@article{Coburn1969OswaldTA,
  title={Oswald Theodore Avery and DNA},
  author={Alvin F. Coburn},
  journal={Perspectives in Biology and Medicine},
  year={1969},
  volume={12},
  pages={623 - 630}
}

• A. Coburn
• Published 7 January 2015
• Medicine
• Perspectives in Biology and Medicine

To one who had no scientific association with Avery's work it seems appropriate to place the following information on the record. I am motivated to make this report because repeatedly I note that many persons in high echelons of science are unaware that Oswald T. Avery envisaged the implications ofthe discovery ofhis "transforming factor." As early as 1943 Avery did indeed understand the significance ofDNA in microbial genetics, the discovery ofwhich culminated his extraordinarily creative life as a member of the Rockefeller Institute. Avery practiced meticulously the sermon that he often preached to his assistants and to the many younger colleagues who came to him for guidance: "Apply your brakes when tempted to blow your own horn." His rigorous self-discipline, along with constant modesty and a deep humility —in the noblest sense of the word—made it impossible for Avery to go far beyond the "facts" in his published work. His high regard for the printed word deterred him from theorizing in print—only the "facts" were admissible—and his own wisdom certainly prevented him from pointing out the great significance ofhis discoveries, perhaps even to the many young men who had the great good fortune to work with "the Fess" (short for professor), as he was called. Prior to 1940 O. T. Avery was only a name—a name which belonged with Theobald Smith, F. Gowland Hopkins, and Marie Curie, persons who had created new disciplines for mankind to explore. Avery had opened the doors to the world of immunochemistry, an achievement vividly brought home by Michael Heidelberger, who occupied the laboratory contiguous to mine. Whenever Fess Avery was mentioned, Heidelberger manifested reverence to such a degree that there was a distinct pause