Maynard Victor Olson is an American chemist and molecular biologist. As a professor of genome sciences and medicine at the University of Washington, be became a specialist in the genetics of cystic fibrosis, and one of the founders of the Human Genome Project. During his years at Washington University in St. Louis, he also led efforts to develop yeast artificial chromosomes that allowed for the study of large portions of the human genome.
Olson was born and raised in Bethesda, Maryland, where he was educated through their public school system. [1] Upon graduating from high school, he received his undergraduate degree from California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and his doctoral degree in inorganic chemistry from Stanford University in 1970. [2] During his time at Caltech, he attended lectures by Richard Feynman which he said was a "memorable experience." [3]
Upon graduating with his PhD, Olson worked at Dartmouth College as an inorganic chemist but experienced "an early mid-life crisis" and chose to change fields. Olsen decided to begin work on genomics in the 1970’s, after being reading Molecular Biology of the Gene, by James Watson [4] . He subsequently took a sabbatical and worked with Benjamin Hall at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle. [5] In 1979, he accepted a position at Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL), where he began to work on the development of systematic approaches to the analysis of complex genomes. [2] Throughout the 1980s, Olson continued to analyze whole genomes in his own laboratory. He worked with a computer developing algorithms for parallel genome mapping projects through yeast while John Sulston focused on nematode worm, Caenorhabditis elegans. [5] This was one of the very first uses of restriction fragment length polymorphisms to map a cloned gene. [3] In 1989, Olson became a member of the Program Advisory Committee on the Human Genome at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). [6]
At the beginning of the following decade, Olson was the recipient of the 1992 Genetics Society of America Medal for his genetic achievements. [3] During the same year, he returned to UW and joined their Department of Molecular Biotechnology. [7] In 1994, Olson was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences. [8] At the turn of the century, Olson was a lead scientist on a study mapping the genome of Pseudomonas aeruginosa which was published in Nature . The implications of this study led to the possibility of new treatments for patients with cystic fibrosis and patients with severe burns and others who develop this type of infection. [9] [10] As a result of his pioneering gene research, he was the co-recipient of Durham, North Carolina's City of Medicine Award. The citation specifically noted that without his discovery, sequencing the human genome "would not have been possible." [11] In 2003, Olson was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for "developing technological and experimental innovations critical to genome sequencing." [12] He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2005. [13] He was also the recipient of the 2002 Canada Gairdner International Award [2] and 2007 Gruber Prize in Genetics. [7]
Olson retired from his position in 2008. [8]
Michael Smith was a British-born Canadian biochemist and businessman. He shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Kary Mullis for his work in developing site-directed mutagenesis. Following a PhD in 1956 from the University of Manchester, he undertook postdoctoral research with Har Gobind Khorana at the British Columbia Research Council in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Subsequently, Smith worked at the Fisheries Research Board of Canada Laboratory in Vancouver before being appointed a professor of biochemistry in the UBC Faculty of Medicine in 1966. Smith's career included roles as the founding director of the UBC Biotechnology Laboratory and the founding scientific leader of the Protein Engineering Network of Centres of Excellence (PENCE). In 1996 he was named Peter Wall Distinguished Professor of Biotechnology. Subsequently, he became the founding director of the Genome Sequencing Centre at the BC Cancer Research Centre.
Leroy "Lee" Edward Hood is an American biologist who has served on the faculties at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the University of Washington. Hood has developed ground-breaking scientific instruments which made possible major advances in the biological sciences and the medical sciences. These include the first gas phase protein sequencer (1982), for determining the sequence of amino acids in a given protein; a DNA synthesizer (1983), to synthesize short sections of DNA; a peptide synthesizer (1984), to combine amino acids into longer peptides and short proteins; the first automated DNA sequencer (1986), to identify the order of nucleotides in DNA; ink-jet oligonucleotide technology for synthesizing DNA and nanostring technology for analyzing single molecules of DNA and RNA.
Lap-Chee Tsui is a Chinese-born Canadian geneticist and served as the 14th Vice-Chancellor and President of the University of Hong Kong.
Yeast artificial chromosomes (YACs) are genetically engineered chromosomes derived from the DNA of the yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which is then ligated into a bacterial plasmid. By inserting large fragments of DNA, from 100–1000 kb, the inserted sequences can be cloned and physically mapped using a process called chromosome walking. This is the process that was initially used for the Human Genome Project, however due to stability issues, YACs were abandoned for the use of Bacterial artificial chromosome
Eric Steven Lander is an American mathematician and geneticist who is a professor of biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and a professor of systems biology at Harvard Medical School. Eric Lander is founding director emeritus of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. He is a 1987 MacArthur Fellow and Rhodes Scholar.
Howard Robert Horvitz ForMemRS NAS AAA&S APS NAM is an American biologist best known for his research on the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans, for which he was awarded the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, together with Sydney Brenner and John E. Sulston, whose "seminal discoveries concerning the genetic regulation of organ development and programmed cell death" were "important for medical research and have shed new light on the pathogenesis of many diseases".
Mary-Claire King is an American geneticist. She was the first to show that breast cancer can be inherited due to mutations in the gene she called BRCA1. She studies human genetics and is particularly interested in genetic heterogeneity and complex traits. She studies the interaction of genetics and environmental influences and their effects on human conditions such as breast and ovarian cancer, inherited deafness, schizophrenia, HIV, systemic lupus erythematosus and rheumatoid arthritis. She has been the American Cancer Society Professor of the Department of Genome Sciences and of Medical Genetics in the Department of Medicine at the University of Washington since 1995.
The Gruber Prize in Genetics, established in 2001, is one of three international awards worth US$500,000 made by the Gruber Foundation, a non-profit organization based at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to genetics:
Stanley Fields is an American biologist best known for developing the yeast two hybrid method for identifying protein–protein interactions. He is currently a professor of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, and serves as chair of the Department of Genome Sciences.
Francis Sellers Collins is an American physician-geneticist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project. He served as director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, from 17 August 2009 to 19 December 2021, serving under three presidents.
Ronald Wayne "Ron" Davis is professor of biochemistry and genetics, and director of the Stanford Genome Technology Center at Stanford University. Davis is a researcher in biotechnology and molecular genetics, particularly active in human and yeast genomics and the development of new technologies in genomics, with over 30 biotechnology patents. In 2013, it was said of Davis that "A substantial number of the major genetic advances of the past 20 years can be traced back to Davis in some way."
Robert Hugh "Bob" Waterston, is an American biologist. He is best known for his work on the Human Genome Project, for which he was a pioneer along with John Sulston.
Stephen Joseph Elledge is an American geneticist. He is the current Gregor Mendel Professor of Genetics and of Medicine at the Department of Genetics of Harvard Medical School and in the Division of Genetics of the Brigham and Women's Hospital. His research is focused on the genetic and molecular mechanisms of eukaryotic response to DNA damage, and is known as the discoverer of the DNA damage response (DDR).
Jennifer Anne Doudna is an American biochemist who has done pioneering 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.
Ronald G. Worton is a Canadian doctor.
Robert Williamson is a retired British-Australian molecular biologist who specialised in the mapping, gene identification, and diagnosis of human genetic disorders.
Johanna Rommens is a Canadian geneticist who was on the research team which identified and cloned the CFTR gene, which when mutated, is responsible for causing cystic fibrosis (CF). She later discovered the gene responsible for Shwachman-Diamond syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that causes pancreatic and hematologic problems. She is a Senior Scientist Emeritus at SickKids Research Institute and a professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the University of Toronto.
Harmit Singh Malik is an Indian American evolutionary biologist who is a professor and associate director at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. He was awarded the 2022 Genetics Society of America Edward Novitski Prize.
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