Definition of Lederberg, Joshua
Lederberg, Joshua definition - medical term (1925- ) American geneticist and microbiologist who
received the Nobel prize in 1958 for his work in bacterial genetics. He shared the
prize with George W. Beadle and Edward L. Tatum, who won "for their discovery that
gene s act by regulating definite chemical events."
Josh Lederberg was born in Montclair, New Jersey, the son of a rabbi. Lederberg's
interest in a scientific career began quite early. His family moved to New York
City when Lederberg was a child, and Lederberg was able to attend Stuyvesant High
School, which concentrated in the sciences. In New York Lederberg was also able
to take advantage of facilities such as the American Institute, which made laboratory
space and equipment available to talented high school science students.
Upon graduating from high school at 16, Lederberg took advantage of a local scholarship
to attend Columbia University. He did not see combat service during World War II,
but, from July 1943, he was enrolled in the US Navy's V-12 training program, which
combined an accelerated premedical and medical curriculum, with active service as
a hospital corpsman in a US Naval Hospital.
The work that led to Lederberg's Nobel began in 1945, when he was a medical student.
The previous year Oswald T. Avery, Colin MacLeod, and Maclyn McCarty had published
their paper identifying DNA as the "transforming principle." This work, which spoke
to the chemical nature of the gene, inspired Lederberg to investigate the possibility
of sexual reproduction in bacteria, which at the time were understood to reproduce
asexually. Lederberg's mentor at Columbia, Francis J. Ryan, encouraged Lederberg
to apply for a position in Edward L. Tatum's laboratory at Yale.
Lederberg took a leave of absence from Columbia to work with Tatum at Yale; he
never returned to medical school. Lederberg's work, which formed the basis for his
Ph.D. dissertation, demonstrated that bacteria can in fact reproduce through sexual
recombination, and opened up the genetics of microorganisms to the traditional methods
of the field. These methods are central to the conduct of biotechnology and genetic
engineering, an industry to which Lederberg has been a consultant since its inception.
Lederberg's name is now mentioned in most textbooks of genetics and microbiology
not only for his demonstration of bacterial conjugation, but also for his discovery
(with Norton D. Zinder) of transduction (a virus-mediated form of bacterial genetic
recombination); for coining the term plasmid to denote extra-chromosomal genetic
material; and for his development of the technique of replica plating. His productive
investigations into bacterial genetics led to his winning the Nobel Prize at the
age of 33, for the work he initiated at age 20.
Shortly after receiving the Nobel Prize, Lederberg joined the new Department
of Genetics at Stanford University's School of Medicine. In 1978, he was appointed
President of Rockefeller University. He became a professor emeritus in 1990.
Adapted from biographical information provided courtesy of the National Library
of Medicine.
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