Mouseover the event title for a more detailed description of the event (if available). To search for particular terms in the description of the event enter the term in the box below 'Event' on the table and press 'enter'. Alternatively use the dropdown lists to filter by Person, Place or Science. Click here to clear the filter.
| Date |
Event |
People |
Places |
Sciences |
The virologists Jeronimo Cello, Aniko Paul, and Eckard Wimmer of the State University of New York, Stony Brook reported constructing an almost perfect replica of the polio virus from published sequences of the virus, and its reverse transcription into viral RNA. Their work was first announced online in 'Chemical synthesis of poliovirus cDNA: Generation of infectious virus in the absence of natural template', Nature, (12 July 2002), doi:10.1038/news020708-17.
2002-07-12T00:00:00+0000| 12 Jul 2002 | | Polio: First ever virus synthesised from chemicals aloneCello, Paul, Wimmer | Stony Brook University | DNA Sequencing, Virology |
Robbins was an American paediatrician and virologist who made his name in 1941 by helping to develop a tissue culture technique to grow the polio virus, one of the most feared diseases at the time. The method involved the growth of the virus using a mixture of human embryonic skin and muscle tissue. It provided an important step towards the development of a vaccine against polio. The tissue culture technique also helped scientists discover new respiratory viruses and paved the way to being able to culture the measles virus to make a vaccine against it. Robbins shared the 1954 Nobel Prize for Medicine for his work. 2003-08-04T00:00:00+0000| 4 Aug 2003 | | Frederick Chapman Robbins diedRobbins | Western Reserve University | Virology, Vaccine |
The vaccine RotaTeq took 25 years to develop. It was developed by Stanley Plotkin, H Fred Clark and Paul Offit.2006-01-01T00:00:00+0000| 2006 | | Vaccine approved for preventing rotavirus, a major kiler of children Plotkin, Clark, Offit | Wistar Institute | Vaccine, Virology |
Published in 'Nature Medicine', the system deloys glycoprotein D fused with genes from target antigens to increase the immune response. The work was led by Hildegund C.J. Ertl.2008-01-31T00:00:00+0000| 31 Jan 2008 | | New vaccine delivery system unveiled for preventing viral diseasesErtl | Wistar Institute | Vaccines, Virology |
Weller was an American physician and virologist whose development of tissue-culture methods, with John P. Enders and Frederick C. Robbins, in October 1949 opened up the means to study viral diseases. Their work paved the way to the development of the polio vaccine. The virus was grown in cultures of human foreskin and embryonic tissues. Weller shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1954 for the 'discovery of the ability of poliomyelitis viruses to grow in cultures of various types of tissue.'2008-08-23T00:00:00+0000| 23 Aug 2008 | | Thomas H Weller diedWeller | Children's Medical Center Boston | Virology |
Dulbecco was an Italian-American virologist who in the 1950s helped to pioneer the growth of animal viruses in culture and work out how certain viruses cause tumours in the cells they infect. He and his colleagues demonstrated that the virus inserted DNA into the DNA of the host cell and this cell transformed into a cancer cell which reproduced the viral DNA along with its own thereby producing more cancer cell. This work not only aided better understanding of how viruses cause cancer, but also HIV. Dulbecco shared the 1975 Nobel Prize for Medicine for his 'discoveries concerning the interaction between tumour viruses and the genetic material of the cell.' 2012-02-19T00:00:00+0000| 19 Feb 2012 | | Renato Dulbecco diedDulbecco | Imperial Cancer Research Fund Laboratory | Genetics, Virology, Oncology |
Griffin was a leading expert on viruses that cause cancer. She was the first woman appointed to Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith Hospital. In 1980 she completed the sequence of the poliovirus, the longest piece of eukaryotic DNA to be sequenced at that time. She devoted her life to understanding the Epstein-Barr virus, the cause of Burkitt's Lymphoma, a deadly form of cancer.
2016-06-13T00:00:00+0000| 13 Jun 2016 | | Beverly Griffin diedGriffin | Imperial College | DNA sequencing, genetics, oncology, virology |
Vaccine developed by David Weiner together with collaborators at Inovio Pharmaceuticals, Inc., GeneOne Life Science, Inc., National Microbiology Laboratory at the Public Health Agency of Canada, and the University of Pennsylvania.2016-06-23T00:00:00+0000| 23 Jun 2016 | | FDA approved first clinical trial for zika virus vaccineWeiner | Wistar Institute, University of Pennsylvania, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, GeneOne Life Science, Public Health Agency of Canada | Vaccines, Virology |
Born in Lithuania, Klug was a chemist and biophysicist who won the 1982 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the development of crystallographic electron microscopy, a method that combines electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction to determine the three-dimensional structure of complex biological materials not amenable to conventional x-ray crystallography alone. The technique provided him with the tool to make many discoveries with his team into nucleic acid-protein complexes. He also made a number of discoveries concerning the structure of viruses. His interest in viruses began g after a chance encounter with Rosalind Franklin in late 1953 with whom he collaborated. Klug also discovered zinc-finger proteins, a class of proteins that bind specific DNA sequences. The modular nature of the proteins is now being harnessed to design synthetic proteins for targeted therapies. The son of Jewish parents, Klug migrated with his parents to South Africa where he stayed until he completed his master's degree and then went to England. He was the director of the Laboratory of Molecular Biology (1986-1996) and President of the Royal Society (1995-2000).2018-11-20T00:00:00+0000| 20 Nov 2018 | | Aaron Klug diedKlug | Birkbeck College, Laboratory of Molecular Biology | X ray crystallography, RNA, Zinc fingers, Virology |
|