Arthur Kornberg, the Stanford University Nobel laureate, who first synthesised DNA in a laboratory and whose identification of the enzymes used by cells to reproduce DNA laid the basis for the biotechnology, died of respiratory disorder on Friday at Stanford Hospital at the age of 89.
Kornberg was the founder of the Stanford University School of Medicine’s biochemistry department, taking in a talented group of unique scientists who worked together for nearly 50 years.
Kornberg lived to see his son Roger win the 2006 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
It is often hard to conceive how little was known about the mysterious DNA molecule when Kornberg began his research in the 1950s. Scientists were pretty sure that it was the repository of genetic information. In spite of that, DNA was a mystery.
During the second world war Kornberg was interested in enzymes, the bioproteins used by cells to carry out chemical reactions, especially the synthesis of substances used by cells.
After preliminary work isolating enzymes involved in vitamin manufacturing, Kornberg tackled the more difficult challenge of DNA and RNA, the messenger molecule used by cells in the conversion of genetic information contained in DNA into proteins.
Kornberg reasoned that cells would produce DNA by stringing together pre-made nucleotides - combinations of a base, a sugar molecule and a phosphate group.
While Kornberg was working on the project in 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick published the DNA structure, providing clues to direct his efforts. By the following year, Kornberg and his colleagues had isolated the enzymes used to produce the nucleotides used in RNA and DNA.
By 1957, Kornberg had discovered and purified the key molecule, named DNA-polymerase, and submitted two papers describing the work to the Journal of Biological Chemistry. Referees, however, objected to calling the material produced by the enzyme DNA.
Disgusted, Kornberg withdrew the papers, but they were published the following year when the journal appointed a new editor.
His work confirmed speculation by Watson and Crick that genetic information was encoded in opposite directions on the two strands of double-helical DNA.
Kornberg shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine for the DNA synthesis in 1959.
In association with Financial Times
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