- Arber, Werner
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born June 3, 1929, Gränichen, Switz.Swiss microbiologist.He has taught chiefly at the University of Basel. He shared a 1978 Nobel Prize with Daniel Nathans and Hamilton O. Smith for the discovery and use of restriction enzymes that break the giant molecules of DNA into pieces small enough to be separated for individual study but large enough to retain meaningful amounts of the genetic information of the original substance. He also observed that bacteriophages cause mutation in their bacterial hosts and undergo hereditary mutations themselves.
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▪ Swiss microbiologistborn June 3, 1929, Gränichen, Switz.Swiss microbiologist, corecipient (Smith, Hamilton Othanel) with (Nathans, Daniel) Daniel Nathans (Nathans, Daniel) and Hamilton Othanel Smith (Smith, Hamilton Othanel) (qq.v.) of the United States of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for 1978. All three were cited for their work in molecular genetics, specifically the discovery and application of enzymes (restriction enzyme) that break the giant molecules of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) (DNA) into manageable pieces, small enough to be separated for individual study but large enough to retain bits of the genetic information inherent in the sequence of units that make up the original substance.Arber studied at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich, the University of Geneva, and the University of Southern California. He served on the faculty at Geneva from 1960 to 1970, when he became professor of microbiology at the University of Basel.During the late 1950s and early '60s Arber and several others extended the work of an earlier Nobel laureate, Salvador Luria (Luria, Salvador), who had observed that bacteriophages (bacteriophage) (viruses that infect bacteria) not only induce hereditary mutations in their bacterial hosts but at the same time undergo hereditary mutations themselves. Arber's research was concentrated on the action of protective enzymes present in the bacteria, which modify the DNA of the infecting virus—e.g., the restriction enzyme, so-called for its ability to restrict the growth of the bacteriophage by cutting the molecule of its DNA to pieces.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
