| Discoveries in Genetics
Some Stanford - and other - contributions | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1866 | Gregor Mendel establishes the principles of genetics. | |
| 1910 | ||
| 1949 | ||
| 1952-53 | ||
| 1955 | Arthur Kornberg synthesizes DNA in a test tube. The feat earns him a Nobel Prize in 1959 -- the same year he brings an entire biochemistry department with him from Washington University to Stanford. | |
| 1964 | Charles Yanofsky establishes the basis for cracking the genetic code. He shows the code is co-linear - groups of the chemicals that make up DNA are translated “word for word” into the amino acids that make up proteins. | |
| 1964 | Stanford’s Philip Hanawalt and Richard B. Setlow of Oak Ridge National Laboratory show that DNA repairs itself. | |
| 1971 | Paul Berg and his colleagues join DNA from unrelated species and lay the groundwork for recombinant DNA technology; Berg receives the Nobel Prize in 1980 | |
| 1971 | Hugh McDevitt discovers genes that control immune responses to foreign substances -- the first suggestion that people may have predictable genetic susceptibilities to certain diseases. | |
| 1972 | Ron Davis and Janet Mertz discover restriction endonucleases, essential for cleaving and “recombining” DNA. | |
| 1973 | Stanford’s Stanley Cohen and UCSF’s Herbert Boyer develop a practical method to clone genes by transplanting them from one species to another. The patents on their processes launch the genetic engineering revolution and earn millions of dollars in royalties for both universities. | |
| 1975 | Paul Berg presides over international Asilomar Conference as scientists propose strict standards for safety in their own recombinant DNA research. By the 1980s, the research is determined to be safe and restrictions are relaxed. | |
| 1980 | David Botstein and Ron Davis, both now at Stanford, and Ray White and Mark Skolnick, now at the University of Utah, propose a way to scan the whole genome to pinpoint the location of genes. This “positional cloning” makes gene-finding practical and creates the need for a human genome map. | |
| 1984 | Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza starts a pilot version of the Human Genome Diversity Project, collecting cell lines from different human populations to study the origins, diversity and unity of the human species. Responding to controversy, the project develops a model ethical framework to protect and respect communities that choose to donate gene samples. | |
| 1986 | Medical student Jeremy Nathans finds the genes for color vision and color blindness, working with David Hogness, Douglas Vollrath and Ron Davis. | |
| 1989 | Congress approves a $3 billion, 15-year project to map the entire human genome, and compare it to the genomes of mice, fruit flies, yeast and other model organisms. Congress mandates 3-5% of the funds to study the ethical, legal and social implications of genome knowledge. | |
| 1990 | An international effort to map the genome for the flowering plant Arabidopsis thaliana begins, led by the Carnegie Institution’s Plant Biology Department on the Stanford campus. | |
| 1992 | In a step toward a cancer vaccine, Ronald Levy stimulates cancer patients’ immune systems with genetically engineered vaccines grown from their own tumors. | |
| 1992 | Uta Francke and Eric Shooter show that the “trembler” gene in mice is the cause of Charcot-Marie-Tooth, the most common nerve disorder in humans. | |
| 1993 | David Cox and Rick Myers are recruited to Stanford from UCSF. Developers of radiation hybrid mapping, a basic tool of the genome search, they join with the DNA Sequencing Technology project headed by David Botstein and Ron Davis to form the Stanford Human Genome Center. | |
| 1993 | Gerald Crabtree develops different genetic “switch” to turn genes on and off. | |
| 1993 | Patrick Brown develops genomic mismatch scanning, a fast way to search for genes in families by comparing the genomes of individuals | |
| 1994 | Victor Dzau tests gene alterations on vein grafts. The new genes help make the veins resistant to clogging by plaque after they are grafted onto arteries in heart bypass surgery. | |
| 1995 | Patrick Brown and Ron Davis develop a microarray technique to show which genes are expressed, or “turned on,” in a cell. The technique helps change scientists’ focus, from a search for individual genes to a search for patterns of gene expression. | |
| 1995 | Phyllis Gardner and John Wagner begin trials to test a new type of gene therapy in young adults with cystic fibrosis. | |
| 1995 | Some genes found at Stanford in ’95: A gene that may be linked to Parkinson’s Disease, and markers for a rare form of epilepsy (Rick Myers and David Cox).Genes for two rare inherited diseases, Williams and Marfan syndromes (Uta Francke). Study shows how the uncontrolled growth of tumors starts with a mutation of the gene for p53, a protein essential for the birth and death of cells(Amato Giaccia). | |
| 1995 | Stanford Program in Genomics, Ethics and Society is founded. A session of the November 1996 International Conference on Bioethics will review the program’s first white paper, on breast cancer gene tests. | |
| 1996 | Matthew Scott uses genome maps to locate a human gene similar to one well-studied in fruit flies. In the process, he finds the gene for the most common form of human skin cancer. | |
| 1996 | An international project led by Botstein and Davis at Stanford sequences the entire 12.5 million base-pair genome of baker’s yeast. A bacterium was charted out in ’95, but this is the first cell with a nucleus to be sequenced. The yeast is put to work testing genes that might have analogous functions in humans. | |
| 1996 | Stanford and other genome centers publish first large-scale “maps” of the human genome, with a marker every 500,000 “rungs” on the DNA ladder. Rick Myers and David Cox are leaders in new phase of National Human Genome Project: to refine maps and sequence every one of the 3 billion base pairs of DNA ahead of schedule, by 2003. | |