What is Biotechnology?

In it’s present form, the term “biotechnology” refers to the use of living organisms or their products to modify human health and the human environment.

The term “biotechnology” was coined in 1919 by Karl Ereky, an Hungarian engineer. Biotechnology has been described as “Janus faced”.  This implies that there are two sides.  On one, techniques that allow DNA to be manipulated, i.e. to move genes from one organism to another.  On the other hand, it involves relatively new technologies whose consequences are untested and should be met with caution. for e.g. stem cells, gene therapy, genetically modified organisms. 

6000 BC – 1700 AD: EARLY APPLICATIONS AND SPECULATIONS

6000 BC       Yeast was used to make beer by Sumerians and Babylonians.

4000 BC        The Egyptians discovered how to bake leavened bread using yeast. 

                        Other fermentation processes were established in the ancient world notably in China. 

                        Molds were used to produce cheese, vinegar and wine were manufactured by fermentation.  The fermentation of milk by lactic acid bacteria resulted in yogurt.

400 BC           Hippocrates determined that male contribution to a child’s heredity is carried in the semen.  By analogy, he guessed there is a similar fluid in women.  Since children  receive traits from each in equal proportion.

320 BC          Aristotle rejected the theory of Hippocrates, said that all inheritance comes from the father's semen, while the mother merely provides the material from which the baby is made.  He suggested that female babies are caused by “interference” from the mother’s blood.

1100-1700 AD    Theory of spontaneous generation, i.e., organisms arise from non-living matter was proposed.

1665 AD         Robert Hooke observed the cellular structure for the first time.

1673 AD        Anton van Leeuwenhoek used his microscopes to make discoveries in microbiology.

1700-1900             THE MIRACLE OF LIFE AND DEATH APPEARS SMALLER ….. AND SMALLER.

1701               Giacomo Pylarini in Constantinople practiced “inoculation”.

1798               Edward Jenner published his book comparing vaccination (infecting humans with cowpox to induce resistance to smallpox) to inoculation  (infecting humans with a putatively mild strain of smallpox to induce resistance to serve strain of the same).

1799               Lazaro Spallanzani described ingeniously crafted experiments to test the possibility of using heat to kill all the microbes in an “infusim”.

1809               Nicolas Appert devised a technique using heat to can and sterilize food.

1850               Ignza Semmelweis used epidemiological observations to propose the hypothesis that childbed fever can be spread from mother to mother by physicians.

1856               Louis Pasteur proved that fermentation is the result of yeast and bacterial activity.

1859               Charles Darwin hypothesized that animal populations adapt their forms over time to best exploit the environment, a process he referred to as “natural selection”.  He emphasized on his idea of “survivial of the fittest”.  His landmark book, “On the Origin of species”, was published in London.

1863               Louis Pasteur invented the process of pasteurization, heating wine sufficiently to inactivate microbes, while at the same time not ruining the flavour of the wine.

1865               Gregor Mendel presented his laws of heredity to the Natural Science Society in Brunn, Austria. 

1870               W. Flemming discovered mitosis.

1871               DNA was isolated from the sperm of trout found in the Rhine River.

1873-6           Robert Koch investigated anthrax and developed techniques to view, grow and stain organisms.

1878              Joseph Lister described the “most probable number” technique, the first method for the isolation of pure cultures of bacteria.

1880               Pasteur published his work on “attenuated” strains.

1881               Pasteur used attenuation to develop vaccines against the bacterial pathogens of fowl cholera and anthrax.

1882               Walther Flemming reported his discovery of chromosomes.

1884               Pasteur developed a rabies vaccine.

1892               Iranovsky reported that the causative agent of tobacco mosaic disease is transmissible, and can pass through filters that trap the smallest bacteria.  Such agents are called “viruses”

1896               Wilhelm Kolle developed cholera and typhoid vaccines.

1897               Eduard Buchner demonstrated that fermentation can occur with an extract of yeast in the absence of intact yeast cells.

Ronald Ross discovered Plasmodium (the protozoan that causes malaria) in the  female Anopheles mosquito and showed the mosquito transmits the disease agent from one person to another.

1900               Walter Reed established that yellow fever is transmitted by mosquitoes, the first time a human disease was shown to be caused by a virus.

1900-1953       CONVERGING ON DNA

1900               Mendel’s work was rediscovered by three scientists – Hugo de Vries, Erich Von Tschermak, and Carl Correns. 

                        William Sutton observed homologous pairs of chromosomes in grasshopper cells.

1904               William Bateson introduced the concept of now known ‘ gene linkage’ and ‘genetic maps’ that describe the order of the linked genes.

1907               Thomas Hunt Morgan in his work with fruit flies proved that chromosomes have a definite function in heredity, established mutation theory and led to a fundamental understanding of the mechanisms of heredity.

1908               BCG vaccine against TB was developed.

                        A.E. Garrod described “inborn errors of metabolism”

1928               Fredrick Griffiths noticed that a rough type of bacterium changed to a smooth type and discovered Transformation.

1935               Stanley crystallized TMV.

1936               Stanley isolated nucleic acids from TMV.

1939               Gautheret cultivated carrot callus cultivars.

1940-1945           Large scale production of penicillin was achieved.

1941                                “One gene on enzyme” hypothesis by Beadle and Tatum.

1944               Avery, McCarty and MacLeod determined that DNA is the   hereditary material inherited in transformation.

1951               Esther M. Lederberg discovered lambda phage.

1952               Zinder and Heidelberg discovered Transduction process.

1953                               Watson and Crick proposed the double stranded, helical complementary, anti-parallel model for DNA.

1953-1976             EXPANDING THE BOUNDARIES OF DNA RESEARCH.

1953               Gey developed the HeLa human cell line.

1957               Francis crick and George Gamov worked out the “central dogma”, explaining new DNA functions to make protein.

1958               Kornberg discovered and isolated DNA polymerase, which became the first enzyme for DNA manipulation in vitro.

1962               Watson and crick shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine with Maurice Wilkins.

1966               The genetic code was “cracked”.  Marshall Nierenberg, Heinrich Mathaei, and Ochoa demonstrated that a sequence of three nucleotide bases (codon) determines each of 20 amino acids.

1967               Many Weiss and Howard Green developed somatic cell hybridization where human cells and mouse cells were grown together in one culture.

1970               Howard Terrion and David Baltimore, working independently, first isolated “reverse transcriptase”.

1972               Paul Berg isolated and employed a restriction enzyme to cut DNA; he used ligase to join two DNA strands together to form a hybrid circular molecule.  This was the first recombinant DNA molecule.

1973               Bruce Ames developed Ames test to identify carcinogenic substances.

1975               Kohler and Milstein fused cells together to produce monoclonal antibodies.

1976               Herbert Boyer and Robert Swanson founded Genetech, Inc., a biotechnology company dedicated to developing and marketing products based on recombinant DNA technology.

1977                THE DAWN OF BIOTECH

1977               Genentech, Inc, reports the production of the first human protein manufactured in a bacteria: somatostatin, a human growth hormone factor.

                        Maxam and Gilbert devised a method for sequencing DNA using chemicals.

1978               Genetech, Inc, and the City of Hope National Medical center announced the successful laboratory production of human insulin using recombinant DNA technology.

1979                              John Baxter reported cloning the gene for human growth hormone.

1980                              Researchers introduced a human gene (that codes for the protein interferon) into a bacterium.

Kary Mullis invented a technique for multiplying DNA sequences in vitro, i.e. polymerase chain reaction (PCR).

1981               Genentech, Inc, cloned interferon gamma.

First transgenic animals was produced by transferring genes from other animals into mice.

1982               Genentech, Inc, received approval from the FDA to market genetically engineered human insulin.

Applied Biosystems, Inc, introduced the first commercial gas phase protein sequencer, dramatically reducing the amount of protein sample needed for sequencing.

1983               Eli Lilly received a License to make insulin.

1985               Genetically engineered plants resistant to insects, viruses, and bacteria were field tested for the first time.

1986               VC Berkeley and chemist Peter Schultz described new method to combine antibodies and enzymes creating “abzymes”.

1990               First gene therapy took place, on a 4-year old gird with an Immune system disorder called ADA deficiency.

                        The Human Genome Project, the international effort to map all of the genes in the human body, was launched.

1994               First genetically engineered food product, the Flavr Savr tomato was  produced.

1997           Cloning of Dolly, the sheep by Ian Wilmut.

Artificial human chromosomes created for the first time.

Fellistin, a recombinant follicle stimulating hormone, approved for treatment of infertility.

Complete genomes of Borrelia burgdorferi, E.Coli and H. Pyroli were sequenced.

1998           Two research teams succeeded in growing embryonic stem cells.

The first complete genome of C.elegans, a nematode was sequenced.

A rough draft of the human genome map produced, showing the locations of more than 30,000 genes.

Gerhardt and James A. Thomson multiplied human embryonic stem cells.

Neuronal stem cells were discovered.

2000           Human Genome project was reported to be completed.

2001           Human chromosome 20 sequenced completely.

Reference:        www.accessexcellence.org