Class
| • | 2. Biological Sciences | [X] |
| | 1 | Name: | Dr. Donald D. Brown | | | Institution: | Carnegie Institution | | | Year Elected: | 1981 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 202. Cellular and Developmental Biology | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1931 | | | Death Date: | May 31, 2023 | | | | | | |
More than a brilliant investigator, Donald Brown has been one of the central figures in the reshaping of the field of developmental biology. As professor and director of the Carnegie Institution of Washington's Department of Embryology, he has for decades studied amphibian metamorphosis and, in conjunction, complex developmental programs such as vertebrate organogenesis. In addition to his work at the Carnegie Institution, with which he has been affiliated since 1963, Dr. Brown has served as professor of biology at Johns Hopkins University since 1968. Both his degrees were awarded by the University of Chicago. A member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences, Dr. Brown is a rare individual whose capacity for communication and synthesis equals his ability in the laboratory. In 2012 he was given the Lasker Special Achievement Award in Medical Science by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation. | |
| 2 | Name: | Dr. John Imbrie | | | Institution: | Brown University | | | Year Elected: | 1981 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 203. Evolution & Ecology, Systematics, Population Genetics, Paleontology, and Physical Anthropology | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1925 | | | Death Date: | May 13, 2016 | | | | | | |
One of the founders of modern paleooceanography, John Imbrie was the Henry L. Doherty Professor of Oceanography Emeritus at Brown University at the time of his death on May 13, 2016, at the age of 90. He had taught at Brown since 1967. He earned his B.A. from Princeton University in 1948 and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Yale University in 1949 and 1951, respectively. Before moving to Brown, Dr. Imbrie taught at Columbia University from 1952-67, starting as assistant professor and ultimately becoming chairman of the Department of Geological Sciences. Dr. Imbrie pioneered the use of computers to analyze microscopic marine fossil data. In the early seventies, he led an international research effort that solved the longstanding mystery of what caused the Earth's great ice ages. Using marine fossils in ocean sediments to unravel the history of the Earth's oceans and climate, Dr. Imbrie helped confirm the theory that the Earth's irregular orbital motions accounted for the climatic changes that caused vast ice sheets to wax and wane on Earth over the past million years. In addition to more than 60 articles in scientific journals dealing with the Earth's past climate, Dr. Imbrie published four books, including Ice Ages: Solving the Mystery, which he wrote with his daughter Katherine, and which won the 1976 Phi Beta Kappa prize. Dr. Imbrie was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1978, and in 1981 was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship. He was a fellow of the Geological Society of America, the American Meteorological Society and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. He had been honored with Columbia University's Vetlesen Prize, the American Geophysical Union's Maurice Ewing Medal, the Lyell Medal for Geology of the Geological Society of London, and the Vega Medal of the Swedish Society of Anthropology and Geography. He also served on numerous national and international scientific advisory committees. | |
| 3 | Name: | Dr. Maclyn McCarty | | | Institution: | Rockefeller University | | | Year Elected: | 1981 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 205. Microbiology | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Deceased
| | | Birth Date: | 1911 | | | Death Date: | January 2, 2005 | | | | |
| 4 | Name: | Dr. Matthew S. Meselson | | | Institution: | Harvard University | | | Year Elected: | 1981 | | | Class: | 2. Biological Sciences | | | Subdivision: | 207. Genetics | | | Residency: | Resident | | | Living? : |
Living
| | | Birth Date: | 1930 | | | | | | |
A geneticist and molecular biologist, Matthew Meselson has conducted groundbreaking research that showed how DNA replicates, recombines and is repaired in cells. His brilliant Meselson-Stahl experiment (with Frank Stahl), in particular, showed that replication of the DNA molecule happens semi-conservatively. After receiving his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology in 1957 and working as a research fellow there, Dr. Meselson joined the Harvard University faculty in 1960. Currently he heads the Meselson Laboratory there, studying the evolutionary genetics of ancient asexuality, and serves as Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences. A member of the National Academy of Sciences, Dr. Meselson has also made influential studies of ecological damage in war and has been an active participant in weapons disarmament policy. | |
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