When Physics Meets Biology

Transversal: International Journal for the Historiography of Science

We discuss a less known aspect of Feynman’s multifaceted scientific work, centered about his interest in molecular biology, which came out around 1959 and lasted for several years. After a quick historical reconstruction about the birth of molecular biology, we focus on Feynman’s work on genetics with Robert S. Edgar in the laboratory of Max Delbruck, which was later quoted by Francis Crick and others in relevant papers, as well as in Feynman’s lectures given at the Hughes Aircraft Company on biology, organic chemistry and microbiology, whose notes taken by the attendee John Neer are available. An intriguing perspective comes out about one of the most interesting scientists of the XX century.

Journal of the History of Biology, 1990

We are grateful to the commentators for taking the time to respond to our article. Too many interesting and important points have been raised for us to tackle them all in this response, and so in the below we have sought to draw out the major themes. These include problems with both the term 'ultimate causation' and the proximate-ultimate causation dichotomy more generally, clarification of the meaning of reciprocal causation, discussion of issues related to the nature of development and phenotypic plasticity and their roles in evolution, and consideration of the need for an extended evolutionary synthesis.

Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 1982

Biological science is a vibrant, collective human endeavor consisting largely of controlled experiments and their critical interpretations. This does not, however, constitute an exhaustive catalog of the component parts of the life sciences. Another element is the context in which these experiments are integrated [I]. I am not speaking here of Kuhnian paradigms or of heuristic constructs, but of intellectual traditions which are not proved or disproved by experiment and which, of themselves, rarely suggest new investigations.1 Nevertheless, these intellectual traditions subtly guide the direction of the entire enterprise of biology. Most analyses of the intellectual traditions in biology have focused on the integration of biological sciences into the larger intellectual ferments of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This essay, however, will attempt to look at the intellectual currents which led to the separation of molecular biology and biochemistry during die mid-twentieth century. Both of diese disciplines attempt to understand die physical basis of life; yet molecular biology was founded by scientists who not only were untrained in biochemistry but were antagonistic to it. In particular, one of the most influential founders of molecular biology, Max Delbrück, "deprecated biochemistry," claiming that the analysis of the cell by biochemists had "stalled around in a semidescriptive manner without noticeably progressing towards a radical physical explanation" [2, p. 22]. This bias was transmitted to several of his students and colleagues. Replying in unkind, the famed nucleic acid biochemist Erwin Chargaff has This paper was submitted in the first Dwight J. Ingle Memorial Young Writers' competition for authors under 35.

1988

Ukrainian Biochemical Journal, 2020

The brilliant book "What is life? The Physical aspect of the living Cell" authored by the prominent Nobel Prize-winning austrian physicist erwin Schrödinger became a successful attempt to bridge the gap between physics and biology. The philosophical thought of one of the founders of quantum mechanics inspired him to look closer at the enigma of life through the lens of quantum physics. a prominent physicist was focused on the thermodynamics of the living organisms and the nature of heredity. Schrödinger introduced the concept and notion of "negative entropy", suggested the idea of a genetic code and argued that the genetic material had to have a non-repetitive molecular structure. He considered a molecule as a solid-aperiodic crystal that forms the hereditary substance. Despite the fact that his book provoked different interpretations and his ideas were modified by later scientific development, it was Schrödinger who paved the way for the future research of genes: his book inspired the next generation of scientists to look for a secret life code, which was eventually found. His outstanding writing is still one of the most profound introductions into the subject and raises new questions. Schrödinger's genius reshapes our view on the nature and essence of life creating a launching pad for the new transdisciplinary paradigm, which can contribute to the development of a unified theory of everything in the spirit of Schrödinger's philosophy. K e y w o r d s: Erwin Schrödinger, Schrödinger equation, Schrödinger's cat paradox, quantum theory, negative entropy, code-script.

The Philosophical Review, 1984

1953 AND ALL THAT. A TALE OF TWO SCIENCES* Philip Kitcher "Must we geneticists become bacteriologists, physiological chemists and physicists, simultaneously with being zoologists and botanists? Let us hope so."-H. J. Muller, 1922' 1. THE PROBLEM T oward the end of their paper announcing the molecular structure of DNA, James Watson and Francis Crick remark, somewhat laconically, that their proposed structure might illuminate some central questions of genetics.2 Thirty years have passed since Watson and Crick published their famous discovery. Molecular biology has indeed transformed our understanding of heredity. The recognition of the structure of DNA, the understanding of gene replication, transcription and translation, the cracking of the genetic code, the study of gene regulation, these and other breakthroughs have combined to answer many of the questions that *Earlier versions of this paper were read at Johns Hopkins University and at the University of Minnesota, and I am very grateful to a number of people for comments and suggestions. In particular, I would like to thank

Ukrainian Biochemical Journal, 2020

In the 20th century, DNA became a magnet, attracting representatives of various sciences. Prominent researchers competed among themselves to discover the structure of DNA and to explain the mechanisms that determine our "natural fate", i.e., our heredity. an american chemist, biochemist, chemical engineer linus Pauling, a British physicist and molecular biologist maurice Wilkins, a British chemist, biophysicist, and X-ray crystallographer rosalind Franklin, an american geneticist, molecular biologist, zoologist James Watson, a British molecular biologist, biophysicist, and neuroscientist Francis Crick were among them. They searched for the scientific explanation for the enigma of life hidden in DNA. An accurate description of DNA double-helical structure belongs to James Watson and Francis Crick. However, the missing pieces of the puzzle were elaborated by Rosalind Franklin, who was not given enough credit for her dedicated scientific work. Unlike her, Francis Crick, James Watson, and maurice Wilkins were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1962 for their discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material. Whatever the DNA story is, it shows that all great scientific discoveries are not made from scratch. The immense number of people have contributed to the development of science and literally every researcher stands on the shoulders of giants, while the idea itself is in the air. The discovery of the structure of DNA became a cornerstone for the new scientific paradigm-biology acquired a molecular and biochemical basis. K e y w o r d s: DNa, DNa double helix, James Watson, Francis Crick, rosalind Franklin, maurice Wilkins, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or medicine 1962.

Journal of the History of Biology, 1971

The origins of molecular biology are numerous and diverse. Three major routes, however, stand out in having attracted its contemporary practitioners, These may be characterized as the genetic, the structural, and the philosophic origins of molecular biology. 1 In 1953 all these approaches were united in a single world-view through the double helix model of DNA. 2 Genetics, like the later founding of molecular biology, also cannot be associated with a single origin. The nineteenth-century history of genetics consisted of the independent activities of plant breeders, cytologists, and evolutionists, and it was not until 1915 that the theory of the gene (then called the factorial

Academia Molecular Biology and Genomics, 2024

This personal essay for the new publication Academia Molecular Biology and Genomics highlights some developments in the early history of molecular biology.