Jean Thomas (biochemist) facts for kids

Dame Jean Olwen Thomas, born on October 1, 1942, is a famous Welsh biochemist. She used to be the head of St Catharine's College, Cambridge, and is now the Chancellor of Swansea University.

Early Life and Education

Jean Thomas grew up in Treboeth, Swansea, Wales. She went to Llwyn-y-Bryn High School for Girls.

She then studied at the University College of Swansea. In 1964, she earned a top degree in chemistry. She completed her PhD in 1967. Her PhD research was about how certain chemicals interact in peptides.

Career and Research in Science

After finishing her PhD in 1967, Jean Thomas stayed at Darwin College until 1969. During this time, she worked at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB). This lab focuses on understanding how living things work to help solve human diseases.

She then became a teacher at the university and a Fellow at New Hall. New Hall is now called Murray Edwards College. She was also the vice president there from 1983 to 1987. In 1985, she received her Doctor of Science degree from the University of Cambridge.

Professor and College Master

Jean Thomas is now a professor emerita of macromolecular biochemistry at Cambridge. She has been a professor there since 1991. From 1993 to 2003, she led the Cambridge Centre for Molecular Recognition.

In 2007, she became a Fellow of St. Catharine's College. In 2016, she became an honorary fellow. She was chosen as the 38th Master of St. Catharine's College in 2007. This was a big deal because she was the first woman to lead the college since it started in 1473. She was Master until 2016.

A special scholarship fund was created in her honor. It is called the Jean Thomas PhD Award. This award helps one PhD student at St. Catharine's College each year.

Work with Other Organizations

Jean Thomas has also helped many other groups. She served on the Council of the Royal Society and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. She was also on scientific committees for the Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine and the Imperial Cancer Research Fund.

From 1994, she was a trustee of the British Museum for ten years. In 2000, she became a governor of the Wellcome Trust. This is one of the world's largest charities for biomedical research. In 2002, she became a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci). She is also a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales (FLSW).

From 2000 to 2005, she was the president of the Biochemical Society. In 2008, she became an honorary member of that group. In 2013, she became a trustee for the Wolfson Foundation. This charity supports science and education. In 2014, Jean Thomas was chosen as the second President of the Royal Society of Biology. In 2018, she became the Chancellor of Swansea University.

She has also received honorary titles from other universities. In 1987, she became an honorary fellow of the University of Wales Swansea. In 1998, she received the same honor from Cardiff University. She also has honorary doctorates in science from the University of Wales (1992) and the University of East Anglia (2002). In 2009, she became an honorary fellow of Aberystwyth University. This was to recognize her amazing career as a Welsh scientist.

Discoveries in Biochemistry

As a biochemist, Jean Thomas has focused on studying chromatin. Chromatin is the material that makes up chromosomes inside cells. She studies how chromatin's structure and movement affect how genes are turned on or off.

She was the first person to find and describe the histone octamer. This discovery helped lead to the universal nucleosome model for chromatin structure. This model was developed by Roger D. Kornberg, who later won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

Her recent work looks closely at proteins in chromatin, like high-mobility group box 1 protein (HMGB1) and histone H1. She studies how these proteins interact with DNA. In 2007, her team used a method called NMR mapping. They used it to understand how the HMGB1 protein interacts with DNA.

A year later, she published a paper about how H1 and HMGB1 have opposite effects on the nucleosome. Histone H1 helps make the structure stable. HMGB1 makes the nucleosome less stable by bending the DNA. Her team also found that H1 can bind to HMGB1. This stops HMGB1 from interacting with DNA.

Jean Thomas also found that HMGB1 helps other proteins, like p53, bind to DNA. In 2012, her team used NMR spectroscopy again. They figured out the structure of how p53 and HMGB1 interact. More recently, she studied similar proteins in fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) and maize. This helped her describe a simpler way that HMGB1's DNA-binding parts control themselves. She continues to lead a research team at the University of Cambridge.

Awards and Honours

Jean Thomas has received many awards and honors throughout her career. In 1982, she became a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO). In 1986, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS). She served as the biological secretary and vice-president of the Royal Society for five years starting in 2008.

In 1991, she became a member of the Academia Europaea (MAE). This group works to promote learning and research. She was awarded Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1993. In 2005, she was awarded Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (DBE). This honor was given for her important work in biochemistry.