George Beadle facts for kids

George Wells Beadle (October 22, 1903 – June 9, 1989) was an American geneticist. A geneticist is a scientist who studies genes and heredity.

He won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958. He shared this important award with Edward Tatum. They also shared it with Joshua Lederberg, who studied how genes work in bacteria.

Beadle and Tatum made a big discovery about genes. They found out how genes control the chemical reactions that happen inside cells. These reactions are called biochemical synthesis.

Their most important experiments used a common bread mould called Neurospora crassa. They used x-rays to create changes, or mutations, in the mould.

They showed that these mutations caused changes in specific enzymes. Enzymes are like tiny helpers that speed up chemical reactions. Beadle and Tatum suggested that each gene is responsible for making one specific enzyme. This idea was called the "one gene, one enzyme" hypothesis.

George Beadle's Life and Career

George Wells Beadle was born on October 22, 1903, in Wahoo, Nebraska. His parents were farmers and owned a farm.

George might have become a farmer too. But one of his teachers encouraged him to study science. He went to the College of Agriculture at Lincoln, Nebraska.

In 1926, after finishing his degree, he studied different types of wheat and corn. In 1931, he received a special fellowship. This allowed him to work at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

He stayed there from 1931 to 1936. During this time, he continued his work on corn. He also started studying crossing-over in fruit flies, called Drosophila melanogaster. Crossing-over is when parts of chromosomes swap places.

In 1935, Beadle went to Paris for six months. He worked with a scientist named Boris Ephrussi. They began studying how eye color develops in fruit flies. This work later led to his famous research on the Neurospora fungus.

In 1937, George Beadle became a Professor of Biology at Stanford University. He worked there for nine years. For most of this time, he worked closely with Edward Tatum.

In 1946, he went back to the California Institute of Technology. He became a Professor of Biology and led the Biology Division. He stayed there until 1961.

In 1961, he was chosen to be the Chancellor of the University of Chicago. Later that year, he became the President of the university.

George Beadle passed away on June 9, 1989.

How His Work Led to New Discoveries

The important work of Beadle and Tatum was continued by other scientists. E.B. Lewis studied how genes control the development of embryos. Embryos are the early stages of a living thing.

Later, Phillip Sharp and Richard Roberts made another big discovery. They found out about introns and RNA splicing. All three of these scientists also won Nobel Prizes for their work.

In 1977, Sharp and Roberts showed that genes in more complex living things are "split." This means they have several different parts along the DNA molecule.

The parts of the gene that contain instructions for making proteins are called coding regions. These are separated by non-coding DNA. The non-coding parts are called introns. Introns are cut out of the gene's message in a process called "splicing."

This "split gene" structure is common in most eukaryotic genes. Eukaryotic cells are cells that have a nucleus, like those in plants, animals, and fungi.

Because of these new discoveries, the "one gene, one enzyme" idea isn't quite as simple as first thought.

• Sometimes, it takes more than one gene to build a protein.
• Also, many different proteins can be made from a smaller set of genes.

However, Beadle and Tatum's original work was a huge step forward in understanding genetics. It opened the door for many more discoveries.

See also

In Spanish: George Wells Beadle para niños