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Reconceiving the Gene

Seymour Benzer's Adventures in Phage Genetics

Frederic Lawrence Holmes author William C Summers editor

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Yale University Press

Published:1st Jun '06

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

Reconceiving the Gene cover

This book relates how, between 1954 and 1961, the biologist Seymour Benzer mapped the fine structure of the rII region of the genome of the bacterial virus known as phage T4. Benzer’s accomplishments are widely recognized as a tipping point in mid-twentieth-century molecular biology when the nature of the gene was recast in molecular terms. More often than any other individual, he is considered to have led geneticists from the classical gene into the molecular age.
 
Drawing on Benzer’s remarkably complete record of his experiments, his correspondence, and published sources, this book reconstructs how the former physicist initiated his work in phage biology and achieved his landmark investigation. The account of Benzer’s creativity as a researcher is a fascinating story that also reveals intriguing aspects common to the scientific enterprise.

“Holmes, a master of the historical fine-mapping of science, uses Benzer’s pathbreaking contributions to show how molecular biology and classical genetics converged in the mid-twentieth century.”—Angela Creager, Princeton University

-- Angela Creager

"Famous for his exploration of the investigative pathways by which scientists have arrived at major discoveries, the late Professor Holmes has here applied this approach to Benzer's study of the fine structure of the genetic map of a bacterial virus. Scholarly, authoritative and a revelation."—Robert Olby, University of Pittsburgh

-- Robert

ISBN: 9780300110784

Dimensions: 235mm x 156mm x 27mm

Weight: 712g

352 pages