Jacques Ricard

Jacques Ricard was born on 6 August 1929 in Marseille,{{cite web | url = https://cths.fr/an/savant.php?id=128398

|title = Ricard Jacques

| publisher = Comité des travaux historiques et scientifiques

}} where he spent his early life and education. After retirement he lived in Lourmarin, in the Vaucluse at the edge of the Luberon,{{cite web | url = https://rsjr.org/jacques-ricard/

|title = Jacques Ricard

| publisher = Rencontres scientifiques Jacques Ricard

}} and he died in Le Nayrac, Aveyron on 28 December 2018. He married Katharina (Käty), philosopher of science and author of Penser la Vie.{{cite book

| isbn= 978-2220031583

| publisher = Desclée de Brouwer

| title = Penser la Vie

| author = Ricard, K.

| year =1990

}}

They had one son, Philippe, a cardiologist.

Ricard studied mathematics and biology at Aix-Marseille University and the Sorbonne (Thèse d'État, 1957).{{cite web | url = https://sfbv.fr/hommage-a-jacques-ricard/ | title = Hommage à Jacques Ricard | publisher = Société Française de Biologie Végétale}}

Ricard started his career as a young researcher in statistics in the laboratory of Georges Teissier at the Sorbonne.{{cite web | url = https://www.insb.cnrs.fr/fr/cnrsinfo/hommage-jacques-ricard | publisher = Institut des sciences biologiques du CNRS | title = Hommage à Jacques Ricard}} After a postdoctoral period at Cornell University he moved to Aix-Marseille University, where he was a lecturer and later professor of plant biochemistry. At the university he created and directed a CNRS laboratory in plant biology, later directing the CNRS Centre for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, also in Marseille. Subsequently he moved to Paris as director of the Jacques Monod Institute, associated with the Université Paris-Diderot and the CNRS. He retired in 1999, but remained active to the end of his life, as exemplified by his book{{cite book

| isbn= 9782705667375

| title = Pourquoi le Tout est plus que la somme de ses parties. Pour une approche scientifique de l'émergence

| author = Ricard, J.

| publisher = Hermann, Paris

| year = 2008

}} in which he explained why the whole is more than the sum of its parts.This is an important idea in the current move away from reductionism, especially in systems biology, followed by another book on a similar theme published towards the end of his life.{{cite book

| isbn= 978-1-60805-813-6

| author = Ricard, J.

| title = Biological Systems: Complexity and Artificial Life

| year = 2014

| publisher =Bentham Books, Soest (The Netherlands)

}}

During the first part of his career Ricard's research was dedicated to the study of enzymes involved in plant metabolism, including yeast hexokinase,{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1970.tb00937.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| volume = 13| number = 2| pages = 347–363

| title = Kinetic study of yeast hexokinase inhibition of the reaction by magnesium and ATP

| first1 = G. |last1 =Noat

| first2 = J. |last2 =Ricard

| first3 = M. |last3 = Borel

| first4 = C. |last4 = Got

}}{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1972.tb02494.x

|journal= Eur. J. Biochem.

|volume = 31|number = 1|pages = 14-24

|title = The theory of alternative substrates in enzyme kinetics and its application to yeast hexokinase

| first1 = J. |last1 =Ricard

| first2 = G. |last2 =Noat

| first3 = C. |last3 = Got

| first4 = M. |last4 = Borel

}} a collaboration with R. J. P. Williams on turnip peroxidases,{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1972.tb01945.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| title = Oxidation-reduction potentials and ionization states of two turnip peroxidases

| first1 = J. |last1 =Ricard

| first2 = G. |last2 =Mazza

| first3 = R. J. P. |last3 = Williams

| year = 1972

}} and other work on peroxidases.{{cite journal

| journal = Phytochemistry

| volume = 28| number =4|pages = 566–578

| first1 = P. |last1 = Penon

| first2 = J.-P. | last2 = Cecchini

| first3 = R. |last3 = Miassod

| first4 = J. |last4 =Ricard

| first5 = M. |last5 = Teissère

| first6 = M.-H. |last6 = Pinna

| title = Peroxidases associated with lentil root ribosomes

| doi = 10.1016/S0031-9422(00)86617-0

}}

A long-term interest in allosteric and cooperative behaviour led to a retrospective review two decades after the principal models of cooperativity were established.{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1987.tb13510.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| year = 1987|volume = 166|number = 2

| title = Co-operative and allosteric enzymes: 20 years on

|pages = 255–272

|first1 = J.|last1 = Ricard

|first2 = A. |last2 = Cornish-Bowden

}}

The study of yeast hexokinase led to what became a major interest, the development of the "mnemonical model“{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1974.tb03825.x

| year = 1974

|journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

|volume = 49|number=1|pages = 195–208

|title = Regulatory behavior of monomeric enzymes. 1. The mnemonical enzyme concept

| first1 = J. |last1 =Ricard

| first2 = J.-C. |last2 = Meunier

| first3 = J. | last3 = Buc

}} as an example of enzyme memory,{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1977.tb11915.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

|volume = 80| number = 2 |pages = 581–592

|title = Enzyme memory. 1. A transient kinetic study of wheat-germ hexokinase LI

| first1 = J. |last1 =Ricard

| first3 = J.-C. |last3 = Meunier

| first2 = J. | last2 = Buc

| year = 1977

}} later extended to multienzyme systems,{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1997.00078.x

|journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

|volume = 246 | number =1 | pages = 78–84 | year = 2004

|title = Memory and imprinting effects in multienzyme complexes. I. Isolation, dissociation, and reassociation of a phosphoribulokinase–glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase complex from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii chloroplasts

|first1 = L. |last1 =Avilan

|first2 = B. |last2 = Gontero

|first3 = S. |last3 = Lebreton

| first4 = J. |last4 =Ricard

}}{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1994.00993.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| volume = 226 | number= 3 | pages = 993–998

| title = The modulation of enzyme reaction rates within multi-enzyme complexes. 1. Statistical thermodynamics of information transfer through multi-enzyme complexes

|first1 = J. |last1 = Ricard

|first2 = M.-T. |last2 = Giudici-Orticoni

|first3 = B. |last3 = Gontero

|year =1994

}}{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1994.00999.x

| journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| volume = 226 | number= 3 | pages = 999–1006

| title = The modulation of enzyme reaction rates within multi-enzyme complexes. 2. Information transfer within a chloroplast multi-enzyme complex containing ribulose bisphosphate carboxylase-oxygenase

|first3 = J. |last3 = Ricard

|first2 = M.-T. |last2 = Giudici-Orticoni

|first1 = B. |last1 = Gontero

|year =1994

}} following a discovery that five enzymes of the Calvin cycle existed as a complex in chloroplasts.{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1111/j.1432-1033.1988.tb14018.x

|journal = Eur. J. Biochem.

| title = A functional five-enzyme complex of chloroplasts involved in the Calvin cycle

| volume = 173| number = 2 | pages = 437–443|year = 1988

|first1 = B. |last1 = Gontero

|first2 = M. L.|last2 = Cárdenas

| first3 = J. |last3 =Ricard

}}

In the light of his textbook{{cite book

| title= Cinétique et mécanismes d'action des enzymes. 1, Cinétique enzymatique phénoménologique

|author = Ricard, J.

|year = 1973

|publisher = Doin, Paris

}} he became a member of the panel that prepared the current IUBMB recommendations on enzyme kinetics.{{cite journal

|doi=

|journal =Eur. J. Biochem.

|volume = 128|pages = 281–291| year = 1982

|author = Nomenclature Committee of the International Union of Biochemistry (NC-IUB)

| title = Symbolism and terminology in enzyme kinetics. Recommendations 1981

|quotation = NC-IUB thanks the panel, whose members were A. Cornish-Bowden (U.K., convener). H. B. F. Dixon (U.K.), K. J. Laidler (Canada), I. H. Segel (USA), J. Ricard (France), S. F. Velick (USA), and E. C. Webb (Australia), for drafting these recommendations.

|pmid = 7151780

}}

In 1983 Ricard organized, with Athel Cornish-Bowden, a NATO Advanced Research Workshop in Marseille on Dynamics of Biochemical Systems in which several notable scientists participated: Keith Dalziel, Albert Goldbeter, Mario Markus, Peter Schuster.{{cite book| isbn= 0-306-41830-4 | title = Dynamics of Biochemical Systems|editor-last1= Ricard|editor-first1=Jacques|editor-last2= Cornish-Bowden|editor-first2=Athel|publisher =Plenum, New York|year = 1984}}

After his formal retirement Ricard became increasingly interested in applying his training in mathematics to general questions of complexity{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1016/j.biolcel.2004.07.003

| title = Reduction, integration and emergence in biochemical networks

|first= J. | last = Ricard

|journal = Biol. Cell

|volume = 96|number= 9| year = 2004| pages = 719–725

}}{{cite book| isbn=

|title = Emergent collective properties, networks and information in biology

|author = Ricard, J.

|year = 2006

|publisher = Elsevier

}} and the origin and definition of life.{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1016/j.crvi.2010.10.003

|first= J. | last = Ricard

|title = Systems biology and the origins of life? Part I. Are biochemical networks possible ancestors of living systems? Reproduction, identity and sensitivity to signals of biochemical networks

|journal = Comptes Rendus. Biologies

|volume = 333|year =2010|number = 11–12|pages = 761-768.

}}{{cite journal

| doi= 10.1016/j.crvi.2010.10.004

|journal = Comptes Rendus. Biologies

|volume = 333|year =2010|number = 11–12|pages = 769-778.

|first= J. | last = Ricard

|title = Systems biology and the origins of life? Part II. Are biochemical networks possible ancestors of living systems? Networks of catalysed chemical reactions: Non-equilibrium, self-organization and evolution

}}

Jacques Ricard was elected corresponding member of the Académie des Sciences in 1990, in the section of integrative biology.

{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ricard, Jacques}}

Category:1929 births

Category:2018 deaths

Category:21st-century French biologists

Category:Members of the French Academy of Sciences

Category:Scientists from Marseille

Category:French biochemists