The collection consists of correspondence, notes, memoranda, extracts from publications, reprints, drafts of essays, poems, magazine and newspaper articles, comic strips, popular songs, and other material on bioluminescence, collected principally between 1945-1959 for his History of Luminescence from the Earliest Times until 1900 (American Philosophical Society Memoirs 44, 1957). Other topics are chemistry, military medicine, natural history, and professional associations.

Theodore Dunham, Jr, (1897-1984) was an American astronomer, physicist, and physician. Throughout his career, Dr. Dunham pioneered research on interstellar cosmic rays, the development of telescopes, stellar spectrophotometry, the study of interstellar material and the spectrophotometry of cells. The Theodore Dunham , Jr. Papers (1921-1984) contain professional correspondence, research notes, published and unpublished works by Dunham and others, detailed photographs and oversize sketches of astronomical observations, administrative details of the Mount Desert Island Astronomical Association and of a career-long association with the Fund for Astrophysical Research. Includes some medical research, but primarily contains his astrophysical research conducted at Mount Wilson Observatory, California and Mount Stromlo Observatory, Australia.

A biochemist at Columbia University, Erwin Chargaff discovered the base-pairing regularities or "complementarity relationships" of nucleic acids that provided one of the key steps in developing a structural model for DNA. During his long career, Chargaff is credited with conclusively falsifying the tetranucleotide hypothesis; demonstrating the existence of a large number of DNA species; and creating the first descriptions of hypochromicity, hyperchromicity, and the denaturation of a DNA. In addition, Chargaff conducted important research on blood coagulation, lipids and lipoproteins, the metabolism of amino acids and inositol, and the biosynthesis of phosphotransferases. He retired to emeritus status in 1974 and remained active in research almost to the time of his death in June 2002. The Chargaff Papers are organized into ten series: I. Correspondence, 1931-1992; Ia. Correspondence, 1949-2002; IIa. Grants, 1930-1982; IIb. Subject Files, 1940-1984; IIc. Subject Files, 1946-2002; III. Works by Chargaff, 1929-1989; IIIa. Works by Chargaff, 1923-2002; IIIb. Reprints, 1977-1999; IV. Works by Others, 1936-1985; IVa. Works by Others, 1976-2002; V. Research Notes and Notebooks, 1929-1951 ; VI. Photographs, 1935-1977; VIa. Photographs, 1928-2002; VII. Audiovisual Materials; VIII. Awards and Certificates, 1958-2001; IX. Lecture Notes, 1942-1985; X. Personal Papers, [1880]-1985.

These are chiefly working papers on subjects requiring statistical analysis and letters, reports, and papers relating to professional organizations. There is little personal material.

Thomas F. Anderson (1911-1991) was a biophysicist and electron microscopist whose research included Raman spectroscopy; the physiology of yeast; the biological effects of radiation; the biological applications of electron microscopy; and the genetics of bacteria, bacterial viruses, and bacteriophage. He was a Professor of Biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania and a Senior Member of the Institute for Cancer Research in Fox Chase.