Dorris J. Hutchison

Hutchison was born in Carrsville, Lexington County, Kentucky on October 31, 1918, the daughter of John and Maud Hutchison. Her father was a merchant.{{Cite web|title=WKU Hall of Distinguished Alumni, Dorris Hutchison|website = YouTube| date=19 March 2019 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le3sTK9wmDE}} She grew up in a rural area by the Ohio River and attended a four-room schoolhouse. Hutchison said that her interest in science grew from her explorations on the river.{{Cite web|last=Skipper|first=Bob|date=2007|title=Searching for Pearls|url=https://studylib.net/doc/14111557/pearls-searching-for|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211007184940/https://studylib.net/doc/14111557/pearls-searching-for |archive-date=2021-10-07 }}

Hutchison attended Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green on a scholarship to study Bacteriology. Hutchison served as a laboratory assistant for L.Y. Lancaster while completing her undergraduate degree at Western.{{Cite web|date=2003|title=Dr. Dorris J. Hutchison|url=http://alumni.wku.edu/s/808/media.aspx?pgid=1778&gid=1}} She received her master's degree at the University of Kentucky in bacteriology in 1943 and her doctorate at Rutgers University in 1949 in the laboratory of Selman Waksman.{{Cite journal|last=Hotchkiss|first=Rollin|date=2003|title=Selman Abraham Waksman|journal=Biographical Memoirs|volume=83|pages=320–343|pmid=14983828}}{{Cite book|last1=Whitaker|first1=Rachel|title=Women in Microbiology|last2=Barton|first2=Hazel|year=2018}} Working with Waksman, Hutchison devised methods for the production and isolation of streptomycin{{Cite journal|last1=Hutchison|first1=D|last2=Swart|first2=E. A.|last3=Waksman|first3=S A|date=1949|title=Production, isolation and antimicrobial , notably antituberculosis, properties of streptothricin VI|journal=Arch Biochem|volume=22|issue=1|pages=16–30|pmid=18127591}} and neomycin{{Cite journal|last=Waksman|first=S A|date=1949|title=Neomycin activity upon Mycobacterium tuberculosis and other mycobacteria|journal=Am Rev Tuberc|volume=60|issue=1|pages=78–89|doi=10.1164/art.1949.60.1.78|doi-broken-date=1 November 2024|pmid=18132054}} as anti tuberculosis agents.{{Cite book|last=Hutchison|first=Dorris|title=Production and tuberculostatic properties of Streptothricin like antibiotics|year=1949}} Hutchison later taught microbiology at Russell Sage College. At Russel Sage, Dr. Hutchison met Dr. Selman Waksman who urged her to teach at Vassar College and later offered her a position as a graduate student in his laboratory.

Hutchison began her career at the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research in 1951 as only the second female faculty member and held several faculty positions at the Sloan-Kettering Division, Graduate School of Medical Sciences at Cornell University (now Weill Cornell Medicine, Graduate School of Medical Science), including associate dean from 1978 to 1987. She was appointed emeritus professor in 1991.

Hutchison originally joined the laboratory of Joseph Burchenal in the Walker Laboratory at Sloan Kettering. Her research centered on agents effective against leukemia and on treatments to circumvent drug resistance that inevitably developed.{{Cite journal|last=Burchenal|first=Joseph H.|date=1953|title=Development of Resistance to 4-Amino-N10-Metyl Pteroylglutamic Acid (Amethopterin) by Streptococcus faecalis|journal=Proc. Soc. Exp. Biol. Med.|volume=82|issue=3|pages=536–538|doi=10.3181/00379727-82-20171|pmid=13047456|s2cid=20699033}} Later in her own laboratory, Hutchison studied the mechanisms of resistance to anti-folate agents. Hutchison and Sirotnak found that resistance to amethopterin in L1210 leukemia cells was due to an alteration in drug uptake and postulated the existence of specific drug transporters. This finding in turn contributed to the concept of multi-drug resistance being mediated by specific transport proteins.{{Cite journal|last1=Sirotnak|first1=Francis M.|last2=Kurita|first2=Soji|last3=Hutchison|first3=Dorris J.|date=1968|title=On the Nature of a Transport Alteration Determining Resistance to Amethopterin in the L1210 Leukemia|journal=Cancer Research|volume=28|issue=1|pages=75–80|pmid=5635374}} One of her major contributions was the development of a cancer treatment using methotrexate with Citrovorum Factor (CF) (leucovorin) rescue.{{Cite journal|last1=Mehta|first1=BM|last2=Hutchison|first2=DJ|date=1975|title=Assay for citrovorum factor (NSC-3590) in the presence of methotrexate (NSC-740)|journal=Cancer Chemother. Rep.|volume=59|issue=5|pages=935–937|pmid=1081908}}

Working with June Biedler, Hutchison's lab determined the chromosomal abnormalities associated with resistance to anti-folate agents.{{Cite journal|last1=Biedler|first1=June L.|last2=Albrecht|first2=Alberta M.|last3=Hutchison|first3=Dorris J.|date=1965|title=Cytogenetics of Mouse Leukemia L1210 I. Association of a Specific Chromosome with Dihydrofolate Reductase Activity in Amethopterin-treated Sublines|journal=Cancer Res.|volume=25|pages=246–257|pmid=14264058}} These studies eventually led to the discovery that dihydrofolate reductase was amplified in methotrexate resistant cells.

In honor of her work as a researcher, educator and administrator, the Dr. Dorris J. Hutchison Graduate Fellowship at the Graduate School of Medical Science at Cornell University was established to be awarded for excellence in research by a student mentored by a Memorial Sloan-Kettering faculty member. Dr. Hutchison was also President of the New York Society of Kentucky Women which provided funds for students in Kentucky Appalachia and especially the Lotts Creek Community School in Cordia, KY.{{Cite web|title=Lotts Creek Community School at Cordia|url=https://www.lottscreek.org/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100129231105/http://www.lottscreek.org:80/ |archive-date=2010-01-29 }}

In 2003, Dr. Hutchison was inducted into the Western Kentucky University Hall of Distinguished Alumni.

Hutchison died on May 9, 2007, in Westerly, R.I.{{Cite web|date=2019|title=Crittenden County, Kentucky Obituary Collection|url=https://www.genealogybuff.com/ky/crittenden/webbbs_config.pl/noframes/read/250|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210909172619/https://www.genealogybuff.com/ky/crittenden/webbbs_config.pl/noframes/read/250 |archive-date=2021-09-09 }}

Hutchison's estate supported both the Cornell University award and a boat to the Stonington High School crew team.{{Cite web|date=2008|title=Gift to Stonington Crew|url=http://www.wostrel.com/shsc/press_releases/dr_doris_h.shtml|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210909182537/http://www.wostrel.com/shsc/press_releases/dr_doris_h.shtml |archive-date=2021-09-09 }} Hutchison also established the Dorris J. Hutchison Scholarship at WKU for women interested in the sciences.

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Category:1918 births

Category:2007 deaths

Category:American women scientists

Category:American medical researchers

Category:20th-century American women scientists

Category:21st-century American women

Category:Weill Medical College of Cornell University faculty