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1987 in science |
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The year 1987 in science and technology involved many significant events, some listed below.
In genetics, complementary DNA (cDNA) is DNA that was reverse transcribed from an RNA. cDNA exists in both single-stranded and double-stranded forms and in both natural and engineered forms.
Self-organized criticality (SOC) is a property of dynamical systems that have a critical point as an attractor. Their macroscopic behavior thus displays the spatial or temporal scale-invariance characteristic of the critical point of a phase transition, but without the need to tune control parameters to a precise value, because the system, effectively, tunes itself as it evolves towards criticality.
The first isolation of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) was done in 1869 by Friedrich Miescher. DNA extraction is the process of isolating DNA from the cells of an organism isolated from a sample, typically a biological sample such as blood, saliva, or tissue. It involves breaking open the cells, removing proteins and other contaminants, and purifying the DNA so that it is free of other cellular components. The purified DNA can then be used for downstream applications such as PCR, sequencing, or cloning. Currently, it is a routine procedure in molecular biology or forensic analyses.
Guanidine is the compound with the formula HNC(NH2)2. It is a colourless solid that dissolves in polar solvents. It is a strong base that is used in the production of plastics and explosives. It is found in urine predominantly in patients experiencing renal failure. A guanidine moiety also appears in larger organic molecules, including on the side chain of arginine.
Per Bak was a Danish theoretical physicist who coauthored the 1987 academic paper that coined the term "self-organized criticality."
Guanidinium thiocyanate(GTC) or guanidinium isothiocyanate (GITC) is a chemical compound used as a general protein denaturant, being a chaotropic agent, although it is most commonly used as a nucleic acid protector in the extraction of DNA and RNA from cells.
Tang Chao is a Chair Professor of Physics and Systems Biology at Peking University.
Acid guanidinium thiocyanate-phenol-chloroform extraction is a liquid–liquid extraction technique in biochemistry. It is widely used in molecular biology for isolating RNA. This method may take longer than a column-based system such as the silica-based purification, but has higher purity and the advantage of high recovery of RNA: an RNA column is typically unsuitable for purification of short RNA species, such as siRNA, miRNA, gRNA and tRNA.
Kurt Wiesenfeld is an American physicist working primarily on non-linear dynamics. His works primarily concern stochastic resonance, spontaneous synchronization of coupled oscillators, and non-linear laser dynamics. Since 1987, he has been professor of physics at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
TRIzol is a widely used chemical solution used in the extraction of DNA, RNA, and proteins from cells. The solution was initially used and published by Piotr Chomczyński and Nicoletta Sacchi in 1987.
Cobalt(II) thiocyanate is an inorganic compound with the formula Co(SCN)2. The anhydrous compound is a coordination polymer with a layered structure. The trihydrate, Co(SCN)2(H2O)3, is a isothiocyanate complex used in the cobalt thiocyanate test (or Scott test) for detecting cocaine. The test has been responsible for widespread false positives and false convictions.
RNA extraction is the purification of RNA from biological samples. This procedure is complicated by the ubiquitous presence of ribonuclease enzymes in cells and tissues, which can rapidly degrade RNA. Several methods are used in molecular biology to isolate RNA from samples, the most common of these is guanidinium thiocyanate-phenol-chloroform extraction. The filter paper based lysis and elution method features high throughput capacity.
Jennifer Anne Doudna is an American biochemist who has pioneered work in CRISPR gene editing, and made other fundamental contributions in biochemistry and genetics. Doudna was one of the first women to share a Nobel in the sciences. She received the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, with Emmanuelle Charpentier, "for the development of a method for genome editing." She is the Li Ka Shing Chancellor's Chair Professor in the department of chemistry and the department of molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley. She has been an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute since 1997.
Diphenyl-2-pyridylmethane is a triaryl organic compound that has been used to selectively extract specific metal ions into organic solvents. Its pharmacology is similar to the stimulant desoxypipradrol in which the pyridine ring is reduced to a piperidine and for which it is a chemical precursor.
Phenol–chloroform extraction is a liquid-liquid extraction technique in molecular biology used to separate nucleic acids from proteins and lipids.
Yoshizumi Ishino is a Japanese molecular biologist, known for discovering the DNA sequence of Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR).
Antonio Barone was an Italian physicist. He was Emeritus Professor of the Federico II University of Naples and Director of the CNR Cybernetics Institute in Arco Felice (Naples), Italy. He is best known for his work on superconductivity and Josephson effect.
Small RNA sequencing is a type of RNA sequencing based on the use of NGS technologies that allows to isolate and get information about noncoding RNA molecules in order to evaluate and discover new forms of small RNA and to predict their possible functions. By using this technique, it is possible to discriminate small RNAs from the larger RNA family to better understand their functions in the cell and in gene expression. Small RNA-Seq can analyze thousands of small RNA molecules with a high throughput and specificity. The greatest advantage of using RNA-seq is represented by the possibility of generating libraries of RNA fragments starting from the whole RNA content of a cell.
Natalie Ann Wolchover is a science journalist. She is a senior writer and editor for Quanta Magazine, and has been involved with Quanta's development since its inception in 2013. In 2022 she won a Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting.
Nicoletta Sacchi is an Italian professor of oncology at the Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center. She is the co-discoverer of the acid guanidinium thiocyanate-phenol-chloroform extraction method to extract RNA from biological samples with Trizol. As a consequence of this groundbreaking discovery she is now considered the most cited woman scientist in the world.