Sydney Brenner (1927–2019), Decipherer of the Genetic Code, An Obituary-Tribute

TCE

The Chemical Educator

ISSN: 1430-4171 (electronic version)

Table of Contents

Abstract Volume 24 (2019) pp 91-92

Sydney Brenner (1927–2019), Decipherer of the Genetic Code, An Obituary-Tribute

George B. Kauffman*

Department of Chemistry, California State University, Fresno, Fresno, CA 93740-8034, georgek@mail.fresnostate.edu

Published: 19 July 2019

Abstract. Sydney Brenner, died on April 5, 2019 in Singapore at the age of 92. He was born in Germiston, South Africa on January 13, 1927, and he shared the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with H.Robert Horvitz and Sir John Edward Sulston for their work on programmed cell death (apoptosis). His wife, May Brenner, née Covitz, subsequently Balkind), whom he married in 1952, died in 2010, and his stepson from his wife’s first marriage, Jonathan Balkind, died in 2018. He is survived by his stepchildren Belinda, Carla, and Stefan Balkind. Brenner’s research with Caenorhabditis elegans, a 1-mm. long, transparent nematode that lives in the soil, into a major model organism for genetics, neurobiology and developmental biology research. This worm is simple, easy to grow in bulk populations, and convenient for genetic analysis. As a direct result of his original vision, it was the first animal for which the complete cell lineage and entire neuronal wiring were known. Today, more than 1,000 investigators are studying C. elegans, and Brenner’s work was further honored when a closely related nematode was named Caenorhabditis brenneri.

Key Words: Chemistry and History; Biography; Biochemistry

(*) Corresponding author. (E-mail: georgek@mail.fresnostate.edu )

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