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RefNoEC/1997/42
LevelItem
TitleGehring, Walter Jakob: certificate of election to the Royal Society
Date1996
DescriptionCertificate of Candidate for Election to Foreign Membership. Citation typed
CitationWalter Gehring is an outstanding biologist who has made contributions of fundamental importance for our understanding of development. In particular by the imaginative and skillful use of cellular and molecular techniques he has revealed the genetic control mechanism by which complete organs such as limbs or eyes are formed in Drosophila. Early in his career he studied the 'Antennapedia' mutation which causes the homeotic transformation of the antennae on the head of the fly into middle legs followed it from its phenotype down to the molecular level and elucidated its mechanism of action. The 'Antennapedia' gene was cloned by 'chromosome walking' and its gene products identified by cDNA cloning. By in situ hybridization and by antibody staining, he localized its transcripts and protein products. In the course of determining the structure of the 'Antennapedia' gene, he and his group detected cross hybridization with the adjacent gene (fushi tarazu) This obsevation was the basis for the discovery of the homeobox, a 180 basepair DNA segment characteristic for homeotic genes and other genes that can specify the body plan and determine cell fate. The homeobox encodes the homeodomain (the DNA-binding domain of the homeotic proteins), which are transcription factors. These transcription factors regulate large sets of target genes involved in morphogenesis. Most importantly, the homeobox is not confined to insects, but it occurs in all metazoa including vertebrates and humans and represents a universal principle of the genetic control of development. Gehring and his group succeeded in inducing antenna-to-leg transformations by the ectopic expression on the 'Antennapedia' gene in the antenna discs of normal 'Drosophila' larvae. The DNA-binding specificity on the 'Antennapedia' homeodomain was determined and shown to depend on specific amino acids contacting specific basepairs in the target DNA. The structure of the homeodomain-DNA complex was determined by NMR spectroscopy at atomic resolution. Recently he secceeded in demonstrating the 'Pax-6' gene of mammals, insects, and mollusks (which contains both a paired and a homeobox) serves as master control gene for eye morphgenesis. Its ectopic expression in 'Drosophila' leads to the induction of supernumerary ectopic eyes that respond to light. This indicates that the genetic control of morphogenesis is much more universal that anticipated and illustrates the fundamental role of homeotic genes in evolution. Together with his colleagues Gehring has established the homeotic genes as key regulators controlling development. The impact of his work has been recognized by numerous honours including Fellowship of U.S. National Acdemy of Sciences, the Jeantet prize and the Orden Pour le Merit.
AccessStatusClosed
Fellows associated with this archive
CodePersonNameDates
NA4706Gehring; Walter Jakob (1939 - 2014)1939 - 2014
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