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Miescher
Miescher was an excellant student despite the fact that he had a hearing handicap. Although he had this handicap it did not stop him,he graduated 1868 and from there on decided to devote his life to medical research.While he was working and studying cells he expieramented and isolated a new molecule. This new molecule was called a nuclien.He did most of his work and research on it in 1869 but didnt get a paper published until 1871 about his new findings. -
Griffith 1928
Griffith's experiment discovering the "transforming principle" in pneumococcus bacteria. Griffith's experiment, reported in 1928 by Frederick Griffith, was the first experiment suggesting that bacteria are capable of transferring genetic information through a process known as transformation. -
Avery 1944
By the 1940s, genes were understood as discrete units of heredity, which also generate the enzymes that control metabolic functions. Contemporary wisdom suggested that genes were proteins. But in 1944, experiments by Oswald T. Avery showed that a nucleic acid, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), known to be ubiquitous in organisms, was the chemical basis for specific and apparently heritable transformations in bacteria. -
Chargaff 1947
Chargaff's most important contribution to biochemistry was his work with DNA. At the time he was working it was not known that genes were composed of DNA. Instead, it was generally accepted that the 20 amino acids which compose the protein in the cell were the carriers of genetic information. It was only in 1944 when O. T. Avery and his co-workers showed that DNA was a key agent in biological transformations that Chargaff realized that DNA could in fact be a major constituent of the gene. -
Franklin & Wilkins 1950s
British-born Francis Crick had a strong background in physics. But Crick was fascinated by biology and decided to switch fields. In 1949, he became a graduate student in molecular biology at Cambridge. Crick’s friend James Watson (1928 - ) was an American from Chicago with a passion for bird-watching. In 1950, Watson left Indiana University with a PhD in zoology and an interest in genetics. -
Hershey & Chase 1952
Hershey and Chase used T2 phage, a bacteriophage, for their experiments. The phage infects a bacterium by attaching to it and injecting its genetic material into it. They put labels on phage DNA with radioactive Phosphorus-32. They then followed the phages while they infected E. coli. -
Watson & Crick 1953
On the morning of February 28, they determined that the structure of DNA was a double-helix polymer, or a spiral of two DNA strands, each containing a long chain of monomer nucleotides, wound around each other. According to their findings, DNA replicated itself by separating into individual strands, each of which became the template for a new double helix. In his best-selling book, The Double Helix (1968).
