James Watson (left) and Francis Crick in 1953 Courtesy
of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Library
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Polio and the Nobel Prize
Over the years, the March of Dimes has funded many research projects related
to polio as
well as other health issues. For example, twenty-four-year-old James
Watson traveled to the University of Cambridge in England on a National
Foundation for Infantile Paralysis grant in 1952. There he met Francis
Crick and began a scientific collaboration that led to the discovery
of the double-helix structure of DNA … and
a Nobel
Prize. |
| The March of Dimes has funded eight Nobel Prize winners: |
 |
1954, Linus Pauling, Ph.D., Chemistry |
|
1954, John F. Enders, Ph.D., Thomas H. Weller, M.D., Frederick Robbins,
M.D., Physiology or Medicine |
|
1962, James D. Watson, Ph.D., Physiology or Medicine |
| |
1969, Max Delbrück, Ph.D., Physiology or Medicine |
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1976, D. Carleton Gajdusek, M.D., Physiology or Medicine |
|
1985, Joseph L. Goldstein, M.D., Physiology or Medicine |
| The influence
of polio extends into other scientific areas. The Salk Institute for Biological
Studies was built by Jonas Salk with funding from the March of Dimes, and
eighteen Nobel laureates affiliated with the institute received March of
Dimes support: |
|
1946, Wendell M. Stanley |
|
1947, Carl F. Cori |
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1958, Edward L. Tatum |
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1962, Francis H. C. Crick |
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1965, Jacques Monod and André Lwoff |
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1968, Marshall Nirenberg and Robert Holley |
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1969, Salvador E. Luria |
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1970, Julius Axelrod |
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1972, Gerald M. Edelman |
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1975, Renato Dulbecco and David Baltimore |
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1977, Roger Guillemin |
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1978, Daniel Nathans |
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1980, Paul Berg |
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1981, Torsten N. Wiesel |
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1987, Susumu Tonegawa |
Innovative laboratory setup at the Salk Institute
for Biological Studies
Courtesy of Salk Institute for Biological Studies
|
In 1963 Jonas Salk founded the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
in La Jolla, California. Dr. Richard Rietz recalled that it “introduced
open laboratories, modular lab planning, ease of communication between
scientists, reconfigurable lab utilities and services, and cantilevered
benches.”
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