Nobel Laureate Biologist. He shared the 2002 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Sydney Brenner and Robert Horvitz for their discoveries about how genes regulate tissue and organ development via a key mechanism called programmed cell death, or apoptosis. He earned both his B.A. (1963) and a Ph.D. (1966) from the University of Cambridge. Following three years of postdoctoral work in the United States, he joined Brenner’s group at the Medical Research Council in England in 1969. It was with this group, that he mapped a complete cell lineage for the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans, a minute soil worm that had been identified by Brenner as an ideal organism on which to study programmed cell death. He showed that exactly the same 131 cells are eliminated by programmed cell death as the animals develop into adults. He also identified the first known mutations in genes involved in the process. His work contributed to important advances in developmental biology and offered insight into the pathogenesis of certain diseases. He would go on to lead the British side of the Human Genome Project. He also served as the director of the Sanger Institute at Cambridge from 1992 to 2000. Besides the Nobel Prize, he received many other awards and honors for his career work. He was the chairman of the Institute of Science, Ethics and Innovation at the University of Manchester at the time of his passing.
Nobel Laureate Biologist. He shared the 2002 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Sydney Brenner and Robert Horvitz for their discoveries about how genes regulate tissue and organ development via a key mechanism called programmed cell death, or apoptosis. He earned both his B.A. (1963) and a Ph.D. (1966) from the University of Cambridge. Following three years of postdoctoral work in the United States, he joined Brenner’s group at the Medical Research Council in England in 1969. It was with this group, that he mapped a complete cell lineage for the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans, a minute soil worm that had been identified by Brenner as an ideal organism on which to study programmed cell death. He showed that exactly the same 131 cells are eliminated by programmed cell death as the animals develop into adults. He also identified the first known mutations in genes involved in the process. His work contributed to important advances in developmental biology and offered insight into the pathogenesis of certain diseases. He would go on to lead the British side of the Human Genome Project. He also served as the director of the Sanger Institute at Cambridge from 1992 to 2000. Besides the Nobel Prize, he received many other awards and honors for his career work. He was the chairman of the Institute of Science, Ethics and Innovation at the University of Manchester at the time of his passing.
Bio by: Mr. Badger Hawkeye
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