American biochemist (1905–2002)
Erwin Chargaff | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1905-08-11)11 August 1905 Czernowitz, Duchy own up Bukovina, Austria-Hungary |
| Died | 20 June 2002(2002-06-20) (aged 96) Manhattan, New York City, United States |
| Nationality | American (since 1940) |
| Education | Maximiliansgymnasium, Vienna College spot Technology (1924–1928) |
| Known for | Chargaff's rules |
| Spouse | Vera Broido (m. 1928; died 1995) |
| Children | Thomas Chargaff |
| Awards | Pasteur Medal (1949), National Medal take up Science (1974) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Biochemistry |
| Institutions | Yale Doctrine (1925–1930), University of Berlin (1930–1933), Pasteur Institute (1933–1934), Columbia Tradition (1935–1974), Roosevelt Hospital (1974–1992) |
| Doctoral advisor | Fritz Feigl |
| Doctoral students | Seymour S.
Cohen, Boris Magasanik |
Erwin Chargaff (11 Esteemed 1905 – 20 June 2002) was an Austro-Hungarian-born American biochemist, writer, and professor of biochemistry at Columbia University medical school.[1] A Bucovinian Jew who emigrated to the United States cloth the Nazi regime, he ballpoint a well-reviewed[2][3] autobiography, Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life Once Nature.[4]
Chargaff was born usual 11 August 1905 to unadulterated Jewish family in Czernowitz, Empire of Bukovina, Austria-Hungary, which run through now Chernivtsi, Ukraine.[5]
At the insurgence of World War I, diadem family moved to Vienna, position he attended the Maximiliansgymnasium (now the Gymnasium Wasagasse).
He run away with went on to the Vienna College of Technology (Technische Hochschule Wien) where he met reward future wife Vera Broido.
From 1924 to 1928, Chargaff deliberate chemistry in Vienna, and attained a doctorate working under integrity direction of Fritz Feigl.[6][7]
He hitched Vera Broido in 1928.
Chargaff had one son, Thomas Chargaff.
From 1925 to 1930, Chargaff served as the Milton CampbellResearch Fellow in organic chemistry go bad Yale University, but he exact not like New Haven, U.s.. Chargaff returned to Europe, swivel he lived from 1930 halt 1934, serving first as say publicly assistant in charge of immunology for the department of bacteriology and public health at integrity University of Berlin (1930–1933) talented then, being forced to abdicate his position in Germany kind a result of the Absolute policies against Jews, as deft research associate at the Chemist Institute in Paris (1933–1934).
Chargaff immigrated to Manhattan, Additional York City in 1935,[8] beguiling a position as a proof associate in the department rule biochemistry at Columbia University, position he spent most of queen professional career. Chargaff became propose assistant professor in 1938 come to rest a professor in 1952.
Care serving as department chair come across 1970 to 1974, Chargaff hidden as professor emeritus. After surmount retirement as professor emeritus, Chargaff moved his lab to Writer Hospital, where he continued give somebody no option but to work until his retirement welcome 1992.[citation needed]
He became an English citizen in 1940.
During rulership time at Columbia, Chargaff in print numerous scientific papers, dealing largely with the study of nucleic acids such as DNA bring into play chromatographic techniques. He became commiserating in DNA in 1944 make something stand out Oswald Averyidentified the molecule makeover the basis of heredity.[9][7][10]Cohen says that "Almost alone among loftiness scientists of this time, Chargaff accepted the unusual Avery put in writing and concluded that genetic differences among DNAs must be imitate in chemical differences among these substances.
He was actually high-mindedness first biochemist to reorganize empress laboratory to test this premiss, which he went on approval prove by 1949."[8] Chargaff put into words of the Avery discovery: "I saw before me (in 1944), in dark contours, the outset of a grammar of biology",[7] and in 1950 he promulgated a paper with the eventuality that the amounts of purine and thymine in DNA were roughly the same, as were the amounts of cytosine innermost guanine.[11] This later became admitted as the first of Chargaff's rules.
Instrumental in his Polymer discoveries were the innovation light paper chromatography,[12] and the commercially-available ultraviolet spectrophotometer tool.[7]
Chargaff lectured enquiry his results at Cambridge Doctrine in 1952, with Watson prosperous Crick in attendance.[13]
Key outlook from Erwin Chargaff's work unwanted items now known as Chargaff's record.
The first and best minor achievement was to show turn this way in natural DNA the give out of guanine units equals rank number of cytosine units perch the number of adenine installations equals the number of pyrimidine units. In human DNA, backing example, the four bases second present in these percentages: A=30.9% and T=29.4%; G=19.9% and C=19.8%.
This strongly hinted towards honourableness base pair makeup of prestige DNA, although Chargaff did cry explicitly state this connection woman.
Robert browning biography videoFor this research, Chargaff enquiry credited with disproving the tetranucleotide hypothesis[14] (Phoebus Levene's widely typical hypothesis that DNA was steady of a large number boss repeats of GACT). Most researchers had previously assumed that deviations from equimolar base ratios (G = A = C = T) were due to unconfirmed error, but Chargaff documented roam the variation was real, partner [C + G] typically come across slightly less abundant.
He upfront his experiments with the lately developed paper chromatography and uv spectrophotometer. Chargaff met Francis Pain and James D. Watson filter Cambridge in 1952, and, neglect not getting along with them personally,[15] he explained his wisdom to them. Chargaff's research would later help the Watson roost Crick laboratory team to infer the double helical structure in shape DNA.
The second of Chargaff's rules is that the stuff of DNA varies from ambush species to another, in single in the relative amounts loosen A, G, T, and Apothegm bases. Such evidence of molecular diversity, which had been unstated accepted absent from DNA, made Polymer a more credible candidate recognize the value of the genetic material than protein.[16]
The first empirical generalization of Chargaff's second parity rule, called rendering Symmetry Principle, was proposed coarse Vinayakumar V.
Prabhu [17] elation 1993. This principle states wander for any given oligonucleotide, sheltered frequency is approximately equal shabby the frequency of its interdependent reverse oligonucleotide. A theoretical generalization[18] was mathematically derived by Michel E. B. Yamagishi and Roberto H. Herai in 2011.[19]
Beginning in the 1950s, Chargaff became increasingly outspoken about the dereliction of the field of molecular biology, claiming that molecular collection was "running riot and involvement things that can never have reservations about justified".[20] He believed that hominid knowledge will always be district in relation to the convolution of the natural world, distinguished that it is simply hardy when humans believe that rendering world is a machine, unchanging assuming that humans can have to one`s name full knowledge of its agency.
He also believed that enfold a world that functions introduction a complex system of interdependence and interconnectedness, genetic engineering make famous life will inevitably have surprising consequences.[1]
After Francis Crick, James Geneticist and Maurice Wilkins received rank 1962 Nobel Prize for their work on discovering the point helix of DNA, Chargaff withdrew from his lab and wrote to scientists all over integrity world about his exclusion.[21]
Chargaff warned in his 1978 book Heraclitean Fire of a "molecular Auschwitz" that "the technology of inheritable engineering poses a greater peril to the world than nobleness advent of nuclear technology.
Diversity irreversible attack on the biosphere is something so unheard strain, so unthinkable to previous generations, that I only wish cruise mine had not been in the clear of it".[22][23][24]
Helping a few couples condemned to childlessness towards etymology a child may strike depiction obstetrical cytologist as such clean up laudable step, but we glance at see the beginning of living soul husbandry, of industrial breeding factories...
Who can deny the controlled interest attaching to the control of chimaeras, to the read of human embryonic growth remodel an animal uterus? ... What I see coming is far-out gigantic slaughterhouse, a molecular Stockade, in which valuable enzymes, hormones and so on will tweak extracted instead of gold teeth.
— Erwin Chargaff, Heraclitean Fire
The IVF come close earned his scathing disapprobation.
Spartan 1987, "Engineering a Molecular Nightmare" was published in the entry Nature,[25] which was then portray by David Alton and dominion colleagues in the All-Party Lawgiving Pro-Life Group (APPPLG) to all Westminster MP in an repositioning to minimise the forthcoming upshot caused by the Human Impregnation and Embryology Act 1990.[22]
Chargaff wrote in 2002 that "There put in order two nuclei that man must never have touched: the minute nucleus and the cell heart.
The technology of genetic ploy poses a greater threat show the world than the arrival of nuclear technology."[26]
My life has been marked by two enormous and fateful discoveries: the farewell of the atom, the brownie points of the chemistry of genetics and its subsequent manipulation.
Site is the mistreatment of pith that, in both instances, whoop-de-doo at the basis: the heart of the atom, the heart of the cell. In both instances do I have prestige feeling that science has demolished a barrier that should have to one`s name remained inviolate. As happens oftentimes in science, the first discoveries were made by thoroughly marvellous men, but the crowd cruise came right after had splendid more mephitic smell.
— Chargaff in Weintraub (2002)
Chargaff died later that class on 20 June 2002 fragment Manhattan, New York City.[27] Subside is buried in Mount Carmel Cemetery (Queens).[28]
Honors awarded to him include the Pasteur Medal (1949); Carl Neuberg Medal (1958);[29]Charles Leopold Mayer Prize;[30] inaugural Heineken Premium (Amsterdam, 1964);[30]Gregor Mendel Medal (Halle, 1968);[29] and the National Garnish of Science (1974).[31]
Elected to significance American Academy of Arts elitist Sciences (1961), the National Faculty of Sciences (1965), and depiction American Philosophical Society (1979)[32] dispatch the German Academy of Sciences.[5]
Honorary Doctorate awarded by Columbia Rule in 1975.[32]
Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from pure Life Before Nature. Rockefeller Founding Press. p. 252. ISBN .
Die Vergangenheit spricht zur Gegenwart. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1982, ISBN 3-608-95004-4
Boston, Basel, Stuttgart: Birkhäuser, 1986
Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1990, ISBN 3-608-95443-0
Autobiographisches und andere Texte. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1995, ISBN 3-608-93313-1
Über die Natur und ihre Erforschung. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2003, ISBN 3-608-93580-0
Retrieved 22 November 2011.
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Candid Science: Conversations With Famous Chemists. World Accurate. ISBN .
"Erwin Chargaff and Chargaff's Rules". Chemistry in Israel - Catalog of the Israel Chemical Society (22): 29–31.
148 (2): 222–228. JSTOR 1558287.
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Mathematical and Improbable Biology. Volume 2 - Arithmetical and Molecular Biophysics. I.C. Baianu.
Mathematical Grammar of Biology. SpringerBriefs loaded Mathematics. Springer. arXiv:1112.1528. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-62689-5. ISBN . S2CID 16742066.
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