Biotech Timeline

  • First Description of the Cell

    Robert Hooke describes the first studies of cells
  • Protiens discovoerd

    Proteins are discovored as the building blocks of life.
  • Hans Christian Joachim was born

    A Danish bacteriologist most well known for having developed a method, called Gram staining, to quickly identify two different large groups of bacteria which is now common in histology and microbiology. Bacteria that absorb the stain which turn purple are known as Gram positive bacteria, and those that do not absorb the stain which might be coloured pink with a counterstain are labelled as Gram negative.
  • James Bryan Herrick was born

    An American physician, Herrick discovered the blood disease sickle-cell anemia. This was the first disease found to have a genetic cause.
  • Nucleus shown to contain genetic substance

    Oscar Hertwig, Albrecht von Kolliker, Eduard Strasburger, and August Weismann independently show the cell's nucleus contains the basis for inheritance.
  • Laws of inheritance

  • Thomas Hunt Morgan was born

    An American geneticist, Morgan discovered the role chromosomes play in heredity based on investigations into Drosophilia, the fruit fly.
  • Theory that cell's nucleus contains genetic substance Haeckel

    Ernst Haeckel, German biologist and philosopher, proposes the cell nucleus contains factors responsible for the transmission of hereditary traits.