The Positive Sum Strategy Harnessing Technology for Economic Growth (1986) / Chapter Skim
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From Understanding to Manipulating DNA
From Understanding to Manipulating DNA
Pages 213-226
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From page 213... ...
This climax, as I recalled in my book The Double Helix, came suddenly, and it was with elation that we saw that the final answer was indeed a golden one. Viewing the double helix with its self-complementary nature brought joy not only to those of us who had won the race, but to virtually all others, like Sidney Brenner, who quickly came over to the Cavendish Lab from Oxford and heard Francis excitedly run over the implications of our model.
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From page 214... ...
Here, of course, Francis was the optimist, while I then could be perceived as either abnormally cautious in seeing what we had staked or as Dying to excel many of my newly acquired English friends in Heir capacity to understate the truly important. In looking back first to the discovery of the double helix and then to the several key steps that led to the emergence of recombinant DNA as an economic force, I shall repeatedly refer to what I believe are several very essential aspects of these scientific discoveries: (1)
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From page 215... ...
Equally farsighted was the support given to Sir Lawrence Bragg in a then still ration-weary England by the Medical Research Council, then ably run by Harold Himsworth. THE CENTRAL DOGMA The first major step forward after the double helix was the elucidation of how DNA provides the information necessary for synthesis of protein.
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From page 216... ...
There was enough to support the losers as well as the winners, and so science seemed the best of all occupations to go into starting in the m~d-19SOs. THE GENETIC CODE Solving the genetic code became a commonly accepted goal virtually as soon as the double helix became known.
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From page 217... ...
cold cells. By 1959 he had shown his synthesis was of double helical DNA and that He templates were always single DNA chains, providing clear proof for our 1953 conjectures about DNA replication arising from the selfcomplemeneary double helix.
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From page 218... ...
Such work first demanded the use of genes present on viral chromosomes, since no way then existed, in general, for isolating specifically desired DNA segments. Isolation of these repressors marked the ending of a more-than-10year interval during which research funds were plentiful for the really top scientists and available in lesser but adequate sums for virtually all competent molecular biolo gists, biochemists, and geneticists.
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From page 219... ...
Luckily the animal viruses whose double helical chromosomes were the smallest also had been recently found to cause tumors when injected into certain animal hosts. So by the 1970s, a steadily increasing group of highly motivated scientists gave up on bacterial cells for research on several groups of DNA tumor viruses.
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From page 220... ...
At the same time as the double helix was discovered, a bizarre exception to conventional genetic behavior emerged from studying bacterial viruses that grew in several types of bacteria. Experiments by Bertani and Luna at Indiana University and by the Swiss physicist Jean Weigle, then at Caltech, revealed that growth in new hosts often leads to modification of the respective viral DNAs that make them more capable of multiplying in similar bacteria.
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From page 221... ...
Once so reinserted, such recombinant DNA plasmids multiply autonomously to yield 25 to 50 copies per cell. Subsequently growing cultures of the bactena-beanng recombinant plasmids effectively "clones" the DNA se=ments inserted into the respective plasmids.
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From page 222... ...
By now, very highly sophisticated recombinant DNA procedures exist for putting in and pulling out specific yeast genes from their respective chromosomes These methods have transformed yeast genetics into a field almost rivaling in its power that of the much more established E cold genetics.
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From page 223... ...
There now also exist specifically modified vertebrate viruses that can be used to clone desired vertebrate genes within mouse or human cells. Stamug to work with new systems (for example, an until now poorly characterized bactena)
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From page 224... ...
I find it impossible to believe that any genetically engineered corn plant could pose a threat to anything except a corn seed company not possessing the means to genetically engineer a similar plant. Therefore, the sooner we exempt all plant manipulations from regulation, the better.
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From page 225... ...
If we can reach this funding level there is no doubt that the United States will maintain its current overwhelming dominance of biological research, and this is bound to have powerful positive economic consequences. By now, however, we have the effective tradition Hat our federal govemment still favors spending more on research on the physical sciences.
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