John Gurdon

{{short description|English developmental biologist (born 1933)}}

{{Infobox scientist

| honorific_prefix = Sir

| name = John Gurdon

| image = John Gurdon Cambridge 2012.JPG

| caption = Sir John Gurdon in 2012

| birth_name = John Bertrand Gurdon

| birth_date = {{birth date and age |1933|10|2|df=y}}

| birth_place = Dippenhall, Surrey, England

| death_date =

| death_place =

| residence =

| citizenship = British

| nationality =

| alma_mater = Eton College
Christ Church, Oxford (MA, DPhil)

| thesis_title = Nuclear transplantation in Xenopus

| thesis_url = http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/OXVU1:LSCOP_OX:oxfaleph019587923

| thesis_year = 1960

| doctoral_advisor = Michail Fischberg

| doctoral_students = Douglas A. Melton
Edward M. De Robertis

| known_for = Nuclear transfer, cloning

| author_abbrev_bot =

| author_abbrev_zoo =

| website = {{URL|https://www.zoo.cam.ac.uk/directory/john-gurdon}}

| footnotes =

| field = Biology and Developmental Biology

| work_institutions = University of Oxford
MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology
University of Cambridge
California Institute of Technology

| prizes = Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize (1977)
William Bate Hardy Prize (1984)
Royal Medal (1985)
International Prize for Biology (1987)
Wolf Prize in Medicine (1989)
Edwin Grant Conklin Medal (2001)
Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award (2009)
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (2012)

| honorific_suffix = {{postnominals|country=GBR|FRS|size=100%}}

}}

Sir John Bertrand Gurdon {{postnominals|country=GBR|DSc|FRS}} (born 2 October 1933) is a British developmental biologist, best known for his pioneering research in nuclear transplantation{{Cite journal | last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B. | author-link = John Gurdon| last2 = Byrne | first2 = J. A. | title = The first half-century of nuclear transplantation | doi = 10.1073/pnas.1337135100 | journal = Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | volume = 100 | issue = 14 | pages = 8048–8052 | year = 2003 | pmid = 12821779| pmc =166179 | bibcode = 2003PNAS..100.8048G | doi-access = free }}{{Cite journal

| last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B.

| author-link = John Gurdon

| doi = 10.1146/annurev.cellbio.22.090805.140144

| title = From Nuclear Transfer to Nuclear Reprogramming: The Reversal of Cell Differentiation

| journal = Annual Review of Cell and Developmental Biology

| volume = 22

| pages = 1–22

| year = 2006

| pmid = 16704337

| s2cid = 6185731

}}{{Cite journal | last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B. | author-link1 = John Gurdon| last2 = Melton | first2 = D. A. | doi = 10.1126/science.1160810 | title = Nuclear Reprogramming in Cells | journal = Science | volume = 322 | issue = 5909 | pages = 1811–1815 | year = 2008 |pmid = 19095934| bibcode = 2008Sci...322.1811G | doi-access = }} and cloning.{{Cite journal

|last1 = Williams | first1 = R.

|title = Sir John Gurdon: Godfather of cloning

|doi = 10.1083/jcb.1812pi

|journal = The Journal of Cell Biology

|volume = 181

|issue = 2

|pages = 178–179

|year = 2008

|pmid = 18426972

|pmc =2315664

}}{{Cite journal

|last1 = Kain|first1 = K.

|title = The birth of cloning: An interview with John Gurdon

|doi = 10.1242/dmm.002014

|journal = Disease Models and Mechanisms

|volume = 2

|issue = 1–2

|pages = 9–10

|year = 2009

|pmid = 19132124

|pmc =2615171

}}{{Cite journal

|last1 = Gurdon|first1 = J.

|author-link = John Gurdon

|title = John Gurdon

|journal = Current Biology

|volume = 13

|issue = 19

|pages = R759–R760

|year = 2003

|pmid = 14521852

|doi = 10.1016/j.cub.2003.09.015

|s2cid = 12271157

|doi-access = free

}}{{Cite journal

|last1 = Gurdon|first1 = J.

| author-link = John Gurdon

| title = Not a total waste of time. An interview with John Gurdon. Interview by James C Smith

| journal = The International Journal of Developmental Biology

| volume = 44

| issue = 1

| pages = 93–99

| year = 2000

| pmid = 10761853

}}

Awarded the Lasker Award in 2009, in 2012, he and Shinya Yamanaka were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for the discovery that mature cells can be converted to stem cells.{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2012/press.html|publisher=Nobel Media AB|date=8 October 2012|title=The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine – 2012 Press Release}}

Career

Gurdon attended Edgeborough prep school before Eton College, where he ranked last out of the 250 boys in his year group at biology, and was in the bottom set in every other science subject.{{cite web|title= Sir John Gurdon Biography and Interview |website=achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url= https://www.achievement.org/achiever/sir-john-gurdon/#interview}} A schoolmaster wrote a report stating, "I believe he has ideas about becoming a scientist; on his present showing this is quite ridiculous."{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2012/gurdon-bio.html|title=Sir John B. Gurdon – Biographical|website=nobelprize.org|access-date=2017-06-03}}{{Citation|last=Gurdon Institute|title=Gurdon Institute {{!}} John Gurdon's 'Journey of a lifetime' lecture, March 2016|date=25 August 2016|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3RuJMTOnE4&t=343|access-date=2017-06-03}}{{cite news|title=None of us should ever be written off|url=http://www.thisisdorset.co.uk/written/story-17110921-detail/story.html|work=Western Gazette|date=18 October 2012|access-date=24 October 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121130032904/http://www.thisisdorset.co.uk/written/story-17110921-detail/story.html|archive-date=30 November 2012|url-status=dead}} Gurdon explains it is the only document he ever framed; he also told a reporter: "When you have problems like an experiment doesn't work, which often happens, it's nice to remind yourself that perhaps after all you are not so good at this job and the schoolmaster may have been right!"{{cite news|last=Collins|first=Nick|title=Sir John Gurdon, Nobel Prize winner, was 'too stupid' for science at school|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/9594351/Sir-John-Gurdon-Nobel-Prize-winner-was-too-stupid-for-science-at-school.html|access-date=29 April 2016|newspaper=The Telegraph|location=London|date=8 October 2012}}

Gurdon went up to Christ Church, Oxford, to read classics then switched to zoology, graduating as MA. For his DPhil degree he studied nuclear transplantation in a frog species of the genus Xenopus,{{Cite thesis|title=Nuclear transplantation in Xenopus|date=1960|publisher=Thesis DPhil—University of Oxford|url=http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/dlDisplay.do?vid=OXVU1&search_scope=LSCOP_OX&docId=oxfaleph019587923&fn=permalink}}{{Dead link|date=November 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}{{cite thesis |degree=DPhil |first=John|last=Gurdon |title=Studies on nucleocytoplasmic relationships during differentiation in vertebrates |publisher=University of Oxford |year=1961 |url=http://www.theses.com|author-link=John Gurdon}}{{subscription required}} supervised by Dr Michail Fischberg at Oxford University.[https://www.zoo.cam.ac.uk/directory/john-gurdon www.zoo.cam.ac.uk] After pursuing further postdoctoral work at Caltech,[http://www.bioch.ox.ac.uk/glycob/rodney_porter_lectures/1999/gurdon.html Rodney Porter Lectures: Biography] he returned to England where his early posts were in the Department of Zoology at the University of Oxford (1962–71).{{Cite web |url=https://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/news/research-and-academia/portrait-of-sir-john-gurdon-unveiled |title=www.chch.ox.ac.uk |access-date=26 April 2023 |archive-date=5 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230705152640/https://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/news/research-and-academia/portrait-of-sir-john-gurdon-unveiled |url-status=dead }}

Gurdon spent much of his research career at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology (1971–83) and then in the Department of Zoology (1983–present). In 1989, he became a founding member of the Wellcome/CRC Institute for Cell Biology and Cancer (later Wellcome/CR UK) at Cambridge, becoming its chairman until 2001. He served as a member of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics 1991–1995, then Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge, from 1995 to 2002.

Gurdon married Jean Elizabeth Margaret Curtis and they had a son and a daughter.[https://www.burkespeerage.com/ www.burkespeerage.com]

Research

File:Xenopus-Nucleocytoplasmic-Hybrid.ogv article co-authored by Gurdon:{{Cite journal | last1 = Narbonne | first1 = P. | last2 = Simpson | first2 = D. E. | last3 = Gurdon | first3 = J. B. | editor1-last = Misteli | editor1-first = Tom | title = Deficient Induction Response in a Xenopus Nucleocytoplasmic Hybrid | doi = 10.1371/journal.pbio.1001197 | journal = PLOS Biology | volume = 9 | issue = 11 | pages = e1001197 | year = 2011 | pmid = 22131902| pmc =3217020 | doi-access = free }} Animal view of different embryos developing in Xenopus laevis eggs: a diploid laevis x laevis is shown on the top, cleaving and entering gastrulation about 50 min earlier than haploid [laevis] x laevis (middle) and [laevis] x tropicalis cybrid (bottom) embryos.]]

=Nuclear transfer=

In 1958, Gurdon, then at the University of Oxford, successfully cloned a frog using intact nuclei from the somatic cells of a Xenopus tadpole.{{Cite journal | last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B. | author-link1 = John Gurdon| last2 = Elsdale | first2 = T. R. | last3 = Fischberg | first3 = M. | doi = 10.1038/182064a0 | title = Sexually Mature Individuals of Xenopus laevis from the Transplantation of Single Somatic Nuclei | journal = Nature | volume = 182 | issue = 4627 | pages = 64–65 | year = 1958 | pmid = 13566187| bibcode = 1958Natur.182...64G | s2cid = 4254765 }}{{Cite journal

| last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B.

| author-link = John Gurdon

| title = The developmental capacity of nuclei taken from intestinal epithelium cells of feeding tadpoles

| journal = Journal of Embryology and Experimental Morphology

| volume = 10

| pages = 622–640

| year = 1962

| pmid = 13951335

}} This work was an important extension of work of Briggs and King in 1952 on transplanting nuclei from embryonic blastula cells{{cite journal| journal=Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A |date=May 1952|volume= 38|pages=455–463| pmid= 16589125|title=Transplantation of Living Nuclei From Blastula Cells into Enucleated Frogs' Eggs|author=Robert Briggs and Thomas J. King| doi=10.1073/pnas.38.5.455| issue=5| pmc=1063586|bibcode=1952PNAS...38..455B|doi-access=free}} and the successful induction of polyploidy in the stickleback, Gasterosteus aculatus, in 1956 by Har Swarup reported in Nature.Swarup H. Production of heteroploidy in the three-spined stickle back (Gasterosteus aculeatus L) Nature in 1956;178:1124–1125. doi: 10.1038/1781124a0; http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v178/n4542/abs/1781124a0.html At that time he could not conclusively show that the transplanted nuclei derived from a fully differentiated cell. This was finally shown in 1975 by a group working at the Basel Institute for Immunology in Switzerland.{{Cite journal

| doi = 10.1126/science.1198115

| last1 = Wabl | first1 = M. R.

| last2 = Brun | first2 = R. B.

| last3 = Du Pasquier | first3 = L.

| title = Lymphocytes of the toad Xenopus laevis have the gene set for promoting tadpole development

| journal = Science

| volume = 190

| issue = 4221

| pages = 1310–1312

| year = 1975

| pmid = 1198115

| bibcode = 1975Sci...190.1310W | s2cid = 23153308 }} They transplanted a nucleus from an antibody-producing lymphocyte (proof that it was fully differentiated) into an enucleated egg and obtained living tadpoles.

Gurdon's experiments captured the attention of the scientific community as it altered the notion of development and the tools and techniques he developed for nuclear transfer are still used today. The term clone{{Cite journal | last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B. | author-link1 = John Gurdon| last2 = Colman | first2 = A. | title = The future of cloning | journal = Nature | volume = 402 | issue = 6763 | pages = 743–746 | doi = 10.1038/45429 | year = 1999 | pmid = 10617195| bibcode = 1999Natur.402..743G | s2cid = 4302017 | doi-access = free }} (from the ancient Greek word κλών (klōn, "twig")) had already been in use since the beginning of the 20th century in reference to plants. In 1963 the British biologist J. B. S. Haldane, in describing Gurdon's results, became one of the first to use the word "clone" in reference to animals.

=Messenger RNA expression=

Gurdon and colleagues also pioneered the use of Xenopus (genus of highly aquatic frog) eggs and oocytes to translate microinjected messenger RNA molecules,{{Cite journal | last1 = Gurdon | first1 = J. B.| author-link1 = John Gurdon | last2 = Lane | first2 = C. D. | last3 = Woodland | first3 = H. R. | last4 = Marbaix | first4 = G. | title = Use of Frog Eggs and Oocytes for the Study of Messenger RNA and its Translation in Living Cells | doi = 10.1038/233177a0 | journal = Nature | volume = 233 | issue = 5316 | pages = 177–182 | year = 1971 | pmid = 4939175| bibcode = 1971Natur.233..177G| s2cid = 4160808}} a technique which has been widely used to identify the proteins encoded and to study their function.

=Recent research=

Gurdon's recent research has focused on analysing intercellular signalling factors involved in cell differentiation, and on elucidating the mechanisms involved in reprogramming the nucleus in transplantation experiments, including the role of histone variants,{{Cite journal | last1 = Jullien | first1 = J. | last2 = Astrand | first2 = C. | last3 = Halley-Stott | first3 = R. P. | last4 = Garrett | first4 = N. | last5 = Gurdon | first5 = J. B. | title = Characterization of somatic cell nuclear reprogramming by oocytes in which a linker histone is required for pluripotency gene reactivation | journal = Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America | volume = 107 | issue = 12 | pages = 5483–5488 | doi = 10.1073/pnas.1000599107 | year = 2010 | pmid = 20212135| pmc =2851752 | bibcode = 2010PNAS..107.5483J | doi-access = free }}{{Cite journal | last1 = Pasque | first1 = V. | last2 = Gillich | first2 = A. | last3 = Garrett | first3 = N. | last4 = Gurdon | first4 = J. B. | title = Histone variant macroH2A confers resistance to nuclear reprogramming | doi = 10.1038/emboj.2011.144 | journal = The EMBO Journal | volume = 30 | issue = 12 | pages = 2373–2387 | year = 2011 | pmid = 21552206| pmc =3116279 }} and demethylation of the transplanted DNA.{{Cite journal | last1 = Simonsson | first1 = S. | last2 = Gurdon | first2 = J. | author-link2 = John Gurdon| doi = 10.1038/ncb1176 | title = DNA demethylation is necessary for the epigenetic reprogramming of somatic cell nuclei | journal = Nature Cell Biology | volume = 6 | issue = 10 | pages = 984–990 | year = 2004 | pmid = 15448701| s2cid = 23201099 }}

Politics and religion

Gurdon has stated that he is politically "middle of the road", and religiously agnostic because "there is no scientific proof either way". During his time as Master of Magdalene, Gurdon caused some controversy by suggesting that Fellows might occasionally be allowed to deliver "an address on anything they would like to talk about" in college chapel services.{{cite web|url=http://www.upublish.info/Article/John-Gurdon-on-ethics--politics--religion--and-anti-theism/775943|title=John Gurdon on ethics, politics, religion, and anti-theism|publisher=upublish.info|author=Johnny Michael|date=11 October 2012|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130328201638/http://www.upublish.info/Article/John-Gurdon-on-ethics--politics--religion--and-anti-theism/775943|archive-date=28 March 2013}} In an interview with EWTN.com, Gurdon declared "I'm what you might call liberal-minded. I'm not a Roman Catholic. I'm a Christian, of the Church of England."{{cite web|url=http://www.ewtn.com/vnews/getstory.asp?number=125061|title=Nobel Prize Winner Participates at Vatican Conference|author=Ann Schneible|date=4 December 2013}}

Honours and awards

Gurdon was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1971, and appointed Knight Bachelor in the 1995 Birthday Honours.

File:Knights Bachelor Insignia.png

Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1978,{{Cite web |title=John Bertrand Gurdon |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/john-bertrand-gurdon |access-date=2022-05-25 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}} the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1980,{{Cite web |title=John B. Gurdon |url=http://www.nasonline.org/member-directory/members/46642.html |access-date=2022-05-25 |website=www.nasonline.org}} and the American Philosophical Society in 1983, since 2005 he has been an Honorary Member of the American Association of Anatomists.{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=John+Gurdon&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2022-05-25 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}

In 2004, the Wellcome Trust/Cancer Research UK Institute for Cell Biology and Cancer was renamed the Gurdon Institute{{cite web |url=http://www.gurdon.cam.ac.uk/ |title=The Gurdon Institute |access-date=2011-07-26}} in his honour. He was awarded the 2009 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award and in 2014 delivered the Harveian Oration at the Royal College of Physicians.{{cite web|url = http://events.rcplondon.ac.uk/index.aspx?eventtype=Lecture|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100607041242/http://events.rcplondon.ac.uk/index.aspx?eventtype=Lecture|url-status = dead|archive-date = 7 June 2010|title = 2014 – Event listing from April onwards|publisher = Royal College of Physicians|access-date = 7 April 2014}} In 2017, Gurdon received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url= https://www.achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/}} A Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) and Fellow of the Zoological Society (FZS), he has received honorary doctorates including Hon DSc (Oxon) and Hon ScD (Cantab) as well as many other awards and medals.

In 1989 he was awarded the Wolf Prize in Medicine “for his introduction of the xenopus oocyte into molecular biology and his demonstration that the nucleus of a differentiated cell and of the egg differ in expression but not in the content of genetic material”.

=Nobel Prize=

In 2012, Gurdon was awarded, jointly with Shinya Yamanaka, the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine "for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent".{{cite web | url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2012/ | title=The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 | publisher=NobelPrize.org | date=8 October 2012 | access-date=8 October 2012}} His Nobel Lecture was called "The Egg and the Nucleus: A Battle for Supremacy".

References

External links

[https://www.sms.cam.ac.uk/media/1119934 Interviewed by Alan Macfarlane 20 August 2008 (video)]
[https://web.archive.org/web/20120510183628/http://www.worldscibooks.com/medsci/7565.html Wolf Prize in Medicine 1978–2008 edited by John Gurdon (book)] including [http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/suppl/10.1142/7565/suppl_file/7565_chap01.pdf Chapter 1: John B Gurdon (1989)] (pdf, 6 Mb)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/09/health/research/cloning-and-stem-cell-discoveries-earn-nobel-prize-in-medicine.html Cloning and Stem Cell Discoveries Earn Nobel in Medicine] (New York Times, 8 October 2012)
{{YouTube|FMVEZaJLNOg|His ("The Egg and the Nucleus: A Battle for Supremacy") and Yamanaka's 2012 Nobel Lectures}} (7 December 2012)
{{Nobelprize|name=Sir John B. Gurdon}}
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLBnidXc7Q8w/ Interview with Sir John Gurdon] at University of Cambridge
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-9pSLQW2TsWhat Cloning, Stem Cells, and Cell Replacement with John Gurdon] at University of California
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiS36VjFrcc Sir John Gurdon - Conversations with History Evolution] at University of California