Arthur Kornberg: The Mastermind Behind DNA Synthesis and Nobel Laureate
Arthur Kornberg (3 March 1918 – 26 October 2007) was an American biochemist. He won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1959 for his discovery of the enzyme DNA polymerase, which plays a critical role in the replication of DNA.
Life and Career
He was born on 3 March 1918, in New York City, U.S. He received his BSc degree in 1937. Then, he joined the University of Rochester Medical Center and got his MD in 1941. He started getting interested in medical research here.
He received his Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Rochester in 1941. He developed a blood plasma substitute for wounded soldiers during World War II. He joined Washington University in St. Louis after the war, where he started working on DNA replication.
In 1953, he and his colleagues discovered the first nucleotide precursor to DNA, which helped explain how DNA is made. Kornberg isolated and purified DNA polymerase in 1957, which was the first enzyme to be implicated in DNA replication.
Kornberg later became a professor at Stanford University, where he continued his research on DNA replication and also worked on the biosynthesis of fatty acids. He officially retired from his post in 1988. Kornberg focused on inorganic polyphosphate metabolism from 1991 onwards, which he considered a “molecular fossil”.
He also published a bunch of papers. He wrote Enzymatic Synthesis of DNA (1961); DNA Synthesis, (1974); DNA Replication, (1980); For the Love of Enzymes: The Odyssey of a Biochemist (1989); DNA Replication (2nd Edition) with Tania A. Baker (1992) and The Golden Helix: Inside Biotech Ventures (2002). He died on 26 October 2007, in Palo Alto, California, U.S.
Award and Legacy
He won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1959 for his discovery of the enzyme DNA polymerase, which plays a critical role in the replication of DNA. He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and received numerous awards and honors for his work, including the National Medal of Science in 1979.
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