Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Whenever science makes a discovery, the devil grabs it while the angels are debating the best way to
use it
.
—Alan Valentine
A new generation of scientists, who had enormous faith in their own abilities and the role of technology,
came of age after World War II. One such man was Herbert W. Boyer—the son of a coal miner and a railroad
worker. Born in 1936 and raised in Derry, Pennsylvania, Boyer was more interested in football than bio-
logy—not the most likely candidate for changing the face of science. But his football coach also doubled as
Boyer's science teacher, and he encouraged Boyer to become interested in science. Boyer became fascinated
at a young age by the 1953 discovery of DNA. He eventually earned a PhD in bacteriology at the University
of Pittsburgh and a postdoctoral fellowship at Yale in enzymology and protein chemistry. In 1966, at the
height of the sixties counterculture movement, he went to San Francisco to be a professor at the University
of California. Pictures of him at that time show a man with longish hair and a mustache. And contrary to
current stereotypes of pro-GMO scientists, he protested on behalf of civil rights and at anti-Vietnam War
rallies.
1
Meanwhile, while Boyer pursued his work, scientists at both Stanford and Harvard were researching gene
splicing and recombining. Paul Berg had spliced genes on segments of the DNA molecule of a virus. Stan-
ley Cohen, located two floors below him at Stanford, was isolating small rings of genetic material from the
E. coli
bacterium. Cohen heard Boyer discuss his work at a conference in Hawaii, and at a fateful meeting
afterward, held in a Honolulu deli, they decided to join forces.
2
This legendary event is captured in a senti-
mental sculpture that graces the campus of the corporation Boyer helped found, Genentech.
The two men, using Berg's work on gene splicing, figured out the basics of genetic engineer-
ing—essentially meddling with billions of years of evolution by moving the genes of one species into an-
other. The result of their historic collaboration was published in 1973.
J. Michael Bishop was on the faculty at the University of California during this period, and he wrote
an introduction to an oral history describing the birth of biotechnology. He says that some members of the
University of California faculty were concerned about the contamination that could occur from Boyer's
work, and that Boyer was moved to “inferior quarters, bereft of virtually all professional amenities.” Boyer
destroyed some of the expensive equipment that he borrowed for the lab, perhaps as “modest revenge for
his ostracism.” Bishop goes on to describe the events that transpired after Boyer and Cohen's work became
public.
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