Thomas Hunt Morgan

See also: Morgan

Thomas Hunt Morgan (September 25th 1866 - December 4th, 1945) was a American geneticist. He studied the phenotypical Zoologie and variations in the fruit fly Drosophile . Its contributions to the genetics are major and it receives the Nobel Prize Médecine in 1933 to have shown that the Chromosome S are the physical supports of genetic information. Its work contributed to the adoption of the Drosophile by the scientists like one of the principal organizations model in Génétique (see for example http://flybase.net/). He is also prize winner of the Médaille Darwin in 1924 and of the Médaille Copley in 1939.

Biography

Morgan born with Lexington (Kentucky) in the USA of Charlton Hunt Morgan and Ellen Key Howard, a niece of the general confederated John Hunt Morgan. It receives its bacchalauréat University of Kentucky in 1886, where it obtains its Master later two years. It obtains its Doctorate (PhD) at the University Johns Hopkins and 1890. While following the example of William E. Castle, it starts to study at the University of Colombia the embryogenesis of Drosophile , the fruit fly, and is interested in the Hérédité. The theories of the monk Gregor Mendel on the genetics of peas had been recently redécouvertes at the beginning of the century and Morgan wished to test these theories in the animal. It continues its work without success during two years before noticing a male fortuitously transferring to the white eyes among the wild individuals with the eyes red-brick. It notes that the descent of a crossing of this male to the white eyes with a female with the red eyes, suggesting that the character " eyes blancs" is Récessif compared to the character red eyes. Morgan names " white" the gene controlling these characters, thus inaugurating a tradition of the geneticists of the drosophila which consists in naming genes according to the phenotype of their Allèle S mutants. Morgan also notices that among the descendants of a crossing of mutant females to the white eyes with wild males with the red eyes, only the males present white eyes. Starting from this result, it concluded that (I) of the phenotypical features are related to the sex (II) the feature " color of the œil" is probably carried by the sexual chromosome (III) that other genes are probably carried by other chromosomes. Morgan and its students analyze the characters of thousands of drosophilas and study their transmission. While being based on the chromosomal recombination, it builds with Alfred Sturtevant the first charts of localization of genes on the chromosomes, the genetic cards. Morgan finishes its career with the Caltech (CalTech) and dies in Pasadena (California).

It leaves behind him a considerable will in genetics. Some of its students will receive after him the Nobel Prize, of which George W. Beadle, Edward B. Lewis and Hermann J. Muller. The Nobel Prize Eric Kandel wrote of Morgan, " Much of discovered Darwin on the evolution of the animal species gave initially a coherence as a descriptive science to the biology of the XIXe century. The discoveries of Morgan on genes and their chromosomal localization contributed to transform biology into a science expérimentale.". The unit of frequency of recombination used in genetic cartography was baptized in its honor the CentiMorgan.

External bonds

  • Thomas Hunt Morgan At Columbia University

  • Thomas Hunt Morgan Biological Sciences Building At University off Kentucky
  • off has Database Drosophila Genoa & Genomes

See too

  • Drosophiliste
  • Genes of the drosophila

June 26th 1919 -->

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