Research Catalog

Title

The strands of a life : the science of DNA and the art of education / Robert L. Sinsheimer.

Author

Sinsheimer, Robert.

Publication

Berkeley : University of California, [1994], ©1994.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

xix, 318 pages, 7 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations; 24 cm

Summary

"During the past fifty years, Robert L. Sinsheimer has been a scientist, teacher, and administrator. He has witnessed and participated in astounding developments in molecular biology, taught at one of the country's leading private institutions, and headed a campus of the largest public university in the nation. His experiences give him a unique vantage point from which to view the paths science and education have taken in the twentieth century." "As a student and then a researcher at MIT in the thirties and forties, as a professor at Iowa State, and then at Caltech for twenty years, Sinsheimer was involved in the discovery of circular DNA and in the first test-tube synthesis of infective DNA. He was a major participant in the "molecular revolution," which radically transformed the science of life and subsequently provided an understanding of biological processes at their most fundamental genetic level, opening the way to genetic engineering and a biology of synthesis." "In 1977 Sinsheimer became chancellor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, at a critical time in its evolution, and ultimately revitalized the campus. He successfully negotiated his transition from the relative calm of private education to the capricious economic and political fortunes of the largest public educational institution in the country. During his ten years as chancellor he was instrumental in establishing the Keck Telescope in Hawaii, operated jointly by the University of California and Caltech, and the initiation of the ongoing national Human Genome Project." "Writing with simple elegance of his life in science and education, Sinsheimer offers historical and philosophical insights into the development of molecular biology, as well as a view of the daily life of a researcher and administrator. His unique perspective on the nature of science and the university will interest a range of readers."--BOOK JACKET.

Subject

• Sinsheimer, Robert
• Molecular biologists > United States > Biography
• College administrators > United States > Biography

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. 301-311) and index.

Contents

The Imprinting -- 1. Boyhood and Youth - The Molding -- 2. Transition 1 -- 3. MIT - The Shaping -- 4. World War II - The Radiation Laboratory -- 5. Transition 2 -- 6. Graduate School -- Science, the Open Door -- 7. Iowa State - The Young Professor -- 8. Iowa State - Research and Discovery -- 9. Max Delbruck - A Caltech Interlude -- 10. A Sidelight on Watson and Crick -- 11. Iowa State - At Full Speed -- 12. Transition 3 -- 13. [Phi][Chi] -- 14. The Caltech Years - The Fulfillment -- 15. Of Honors, Awards, and Prizes -- 16. Transition 4 -- 17. Science and Society - Toward Wider Horizons -- 18. The Caltech Years - The Chairman -- 19. Transition 5 -- UC Santa Cruz: The Anomalous Campus -- 20. The Prologue -- 21. The Education of a Chancellor -- 22. The Club of Nine -- 23. Two Presidents -- 24. The Regents -- 25. The Faculty -- 26. The Students -- 27. The Community -- 28. "What Does the Chancellor Do?" -- 29. The Telescope and the Genome -- 30. Transition 6 -- Ending Well -- 31. Return to Science -- 32. "We Happy Few"

ISBN

0520082486 (alk. paper)

LCCN

93013122

OCLC

ocm27937182

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries