Science Spin September 2008 : Sponsored Content - Trinity College Dublin

Celebrating 50 years of Genetics

Genetics is the fundamental science of life, the study of how organisms replicate, how characteristics are inherited, and how they evolve. From a slow start in the first half of the 20th century, genetics now occupies a key position in the study of biology. Medicine, agriculture, industry and forensic science have been revolutionised by modern biotechnology, a method of manipulating genes, which emerged from key discoveries made by geneticists in the period 1960-1980.

Ireland has made significant contributions to the science of genetics. Desmond Bernal, born in Tipperary, developed new physical methods in the 1930s at Cambridge which ultimately allowed others to obtain the structure of large molecules - genes are made of very large molecules of DNA. At about the same time, the great Austrian physicist and Nobel prizewinner, Erwin Schroedinger, was persuaded to come to the new Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies, set up by Eamonn de Valera.

In 1944 he gave three lectures in Trinity on "What is life?" and these were published in a book that influenced many scientists to take an interest in genetics. One of these was Maurice Wilkins, born in New Zealand, the son of Irish parents, who was a student of Bernal at Cambridge. Later in London, he led the team that used Bernal's tricks to get images of DNA, and these were vital evidence used by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953 to propose that DNA was a double helix, what Crick called "the secret of life".

Genetics began to accelerate. The Department of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin was founded in 1958 by George Dawson (1927-2004) with a grant of £15,000 from General Costello, the head of The Irish Sugar Company. Dawson and his students, including Peter Smith Keary, John Atkins and Shahla Thompson, focussed on the extraordinarily important field of bacterial genetics, much funded by the Medical Research Council. Dawson built a close relationship with the Agricultural Institute (now Teagasc) and Patrick Cunningham and Vincent Connolly from the Institute began to give courses in animal and plant genetics. Cunningham retains his personal chair in Trinity and is now the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government.

Dawson and Smith Keary introduced methods of teaching and examining, emphasising the importance of evidence, and these methods have been followed closely ever since. He ensured that the department paid attention to the two pillars of genetics, the mathematical and the molecular. He saw talent in all students and encouraged them to develop and use their abilities to the utmost, opening doors for them at every turn. He exemplified Richard Feynman's idea of "The pleasure of finding things out". From 1975 William Vincent has generously provided scholarships to encourage Trinity genetics students to spend summers at US research laboratories.

The Department moved into the state-of-the-art Smurfit Institute of Genetics in 1998 with wonderful support from Dr Michael Smurfit, Dr Martin Naughton, Atlantic Philanthropies and the Wellcome Trust.

In the second half of the 20th century, as genetics became the most influential of the biological sciences, the department extended research in Trinity into molecular genetics (the isolation of single genes, genetic engineering, genetic control networks and genome sequencing) and medical genetics (the genetics of blindness, cancer and psychiatric disorders), then into molecular evolution (the evolution of HIV, yeast, cattle) and plant genetics (the genetic regulation of flower shape and size), and most recently into neurogenetics (the genetic control of the structure and function of the nervous system).

Today the Department has an international reputation for teaching and research. The Smurfit Institute is currently in receipt of over €7 million in annual research funding and hosts 15 research groups with over 100 members of postgraduate staff from 30 countries. Science Foundation Ireland has played a major role in funding research in biotechnology and genetics, enabling Trinity last year to be ranked seventh among world universities in genetics and molecular biology on the basis of citations per paper.

510 students have graduated with BA in Genetics (TR071) or BA in Human Genetics (TR073) and more than 100 have obtained MSc or PhD degrees. The graduates have gone on to fine careers all over the world in many walks of life "providing some evidence" that geneticists can do anything.

The Smurfit Institute of Genetics will celebrate 50 years of Trinity genetics with a symposium 17-20th September, and all are welcome. The Public Symposium "The Secret of Life: Genetics in the 21st Century" on Saturday 20th September should be especially interesting to non-specialists and to students who are considering studies in any branch of science and technology.

For more information please visit click here