The Gene Calendar — a calendar of events in Genetics
The Gene Calendar
Genetics has come from nothing to scaring the pants off scriptwriters for X-files in just 60 years. Scientists in Europe and Japan are involved in the Human Genome Project, working out newer strategies of sequencing every day. Sequencing by hybridization is an example. This calendar is a small attempt to catalog all those who contributed to genetics in some way
The Calendar of Events in the development of molecular genetics
| 1941 | Beadle and Tatum develop the one-gene-one-enzyme theory |
| 1944 | Avery and co-workers demonstrate that DNA is the genetic material |
| 1953 | Watson and Crick come out with the double-helix model of DNA structure |
| 1956 | In vitro synthesis of RNA by Ochoa, In vitro synthesis of DNA by Kornberg |
| 1958 | Crick predicts the existance of tRNA |
| 1960 | Marmur and Doty: Discovery of DNA denaturation and renaturation |
| 1961 | DNA/RNA hybrids produced by Hall and Speigelmann. Jacob and Monod predict the existance of mRNA The triplet code nature of the genetic material proved by Crick and Brenner |
| 1962 | Arber postulates the existance of restriction endonucleases |
| 1965 | The first automated polypeptide synthesizer: Merrifield and Stewart |
| 1967 | Nirenberg, Holley and Khorana decipher the gnentic code Gellert purifies DNA ligase |
| 1968 | Smith, Wilcox and Kelly purify the first restriction endonuclease |
| 1969 | in situ hybridization of mammalian chromosomes: Gall and Pardue |
| 1970 | Temin and Baltimore discover reverse transcriptase Campersson demonstrates chromosome banding patterns |
| 1971 | The restriction map of the SV40 virus published by Dana and Nathans |
| 1972-3 | The first recombinant DNA molecules are produced in the labaratories of Berg, Cohen and Boyer |
| 1974 | Murray and Murray create the first phage vector |
| 1975 | Grunstien and Hogness develop the colony hybridization method for the isolation of cloned DNAs containing specific sequences The firstmonoclonal antibodies produced: Kohler and Milstien |
| 1976 | Application of a DNA probe in the prenatal diagnosis of alpha-thalassemia; Kan globus and Dozy Tonegawa proves that antibody diversity is a dirct consequense of recombination of antibody determining sequences The first mammalian protien coding gene cloned into a lambda vector by Leder and co-workers. |
| 1977 | Rapid DNA sequenceing methodologies are announced by Sanger and by Maxam and Gilbert The artificially synthesized protein in the lab-human somatostatin proves useful too! Various labaratories are surprised to discover introns Collins and Holm develop Cosmids |
| 1978 | Maniatis and co-workers develop the world's first gene libraries RFLPs first used in the prenatal diagnosis of sickle cell disease:Kan and Dozy |
| 1979 | Goeddel announces the production of recombinant growth hormone in bacteria |
| 1980 | Ruddle and co-workers develop transgenic mice |
| 1981 | Parker, Varmus and Bishop distinguish between viral oncogenes and cellular oncogenes Sanger and others sequence the complete mitochondrial genome |
| 1982 | The isolation and charecterization of the first human oncogene |
| 1985 | DNA fingerprinting by Jeffries. |
| 1985-6 | Kary Milus and others at the Cetus Corporation develop the Polymerase Chain reaction The DMD gene is cloned at the labaratories of Kunkel and Worton. |
| 1987 | The YAC vector developed by Olsen and co-workers Knudson and Cavanee identify the tumour supressor functions of the retinoblastoma gene |
| 1988 | Francis, Tui and others develop the technique of gene walking The method of interaction trapping is reported by Fields and Song |
| 1990 | Barry invents the ligase chain reaction |
Adopted from the book Genes in Medicine, Istvan Rasko and
C. Stephen Downes, Chapman and Hall