Friedrich Miescher

Infobox Scientist
name = Friedrich Miescher
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caption = Friedrich Miescher
birth_date = 13 August 1844
birth_place = Basel
death_date = 26 August 1895
death_place = Davos
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nationality = Swiss
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field = biology
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known_for = nucleic acids
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Johannes Friedrich Miescher (13 August 1844, Basel - 26 August 1895, Davos) was a Swiss biologist. He isolated various phosphate-rich chemicals, which he called "nuclein" (now nucleic acids), from the nuclei of white blood cells in 1869 at Felix Hoppe-Seyler's laboratory at the University of Tübingen, Germany, paving the way for the identification of DNA as the carrier of inheritance. The significance of the discovery, first published in 1871, was not at first apparent, and it was Albrecht Kossel who made the initial inquiries into its chemical structure.

Miescher came from a scientific family: his father and his uncle held the chair of anatomy at the University of Basel. As a boy he was shy but intelligent. He had a partial hearing impairment due to a severe attack of typhus. But this did not stop him from having an interest in music and his father performed publicly. Miescher himself studied medicine at Basel. In the summer of 1865 Friedrich worked for the organic chemist Adolf Stecker in Göttingen. His studies were interrupted for the year when he became ill with typhoid fever; however, he still received his M.D. in 1868.

Miescher felt that his partial deafness would be a disadvantage as a doctor so he turned to physiological chemistry. Miescher originally wanted to study lymphocytes but was encouraged by Felix Hoppe-Seyler to study leucocytes. Miescher was interested in studying the chemistry of the nucleus. Lymphocytes were difficult to obtain in sufficient enough numbers to study while leucocytes were known to be the one of the main components in pus and could be obtained from bandages at the nearby hospital. The problem was, however, washing the cells off the bandages without damaging them.

Miescher devised different salt solutions eventually producing one with sodium sulfate. The cells were filtered. Since centrifuges were not present at this time the cells were allowed to settle at the bottom of a beaker. He then tried to isolate the nuclei free of cytoplasm. He subjected the purified nuclei to an alkaline extraction followed by acidification resulting in a precipitate being formed which Miescher called "nuclein" (now known as DNA). He found that this contained phosphorus, nitrogen, and sulfur. The discovery was so unlike anything else at the time that Hoppe-Seyler repeated all Miescher's research himself before publishing it in his journal. Friedrich then went on to study physiology at Leipzig in the laboratory of Carl Ludwig for a year before returning to Basel where he was appointed professor of physiology.

Miescher and his students researched much of the nucleic acid chemistry but their function remained unknown. However, his discovery played an important part in the identification of nucleic acids as the carriers of inheritance. The importance of Miescher's discovery was not apparent until Albrecht Kossel (a German physiologist specializing in the physiological chemistry of the cell and its nucleus and of proteins) carried out research on the chemical structure of nuclein. Friedrich Miescher is also known for demonstrating that carbon dioxide concentrations in blood regulate breathing.

He died of tuberculosis in 1895 aged 51. He has had a laboratory of the Max Planck Society in Tübingen and a research institute in Basel named after him.

References

*Citation
id = PMID:17901982
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17901982
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first=Ralf
publication-date=2008 Jan
year=2008
title=Discovering DNA: Friedrich Miescher and the early years of nucleic acid research.
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periodical=Hum. Genet.
pages=565–81
doi = 10.1007/s00439-007-0433-0
journal=Human Genetics
*Citation
id = PMID:15680349
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15680349
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url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15296772
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publication-date=2004 Aug 10
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*Citation
id = PMID:4908150
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*Citation
id = PMID:4921671
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*Citation
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url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4910336
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publication-date=1970 Jan
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volume=25
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periodical=Bulletin der Schweizerischen Akademie der Medizinischen Wissenschaften
pages=9–24
*Citation
id = PMID:4908661
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4908661
last=Bernhard
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publication-date=1970 Jan
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title= [Jonhannes Friedrich Miescher Symposium. 100th anniversary of the discovery of nucleic acids. Welcome]
volume=25
issue=1-2
periodical=Bulletin der Schweizerischen Akademie der Medizinischen Wissenschaften
pages=32–4
*Citation
id = PMID:4903604
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4903604
last=Harbers
first=E
publication-date=1969 Oct
year=1969
title=On the discovery of DNA by Friedrich Miescher 100 years ago.
volume=14
issue=10
periodical=German medical monthly
pages=517–8
*Citation
id = PMID:4897532
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4897532
last=Harbers
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publication-date=1969 Sep 19
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periodical=Dtsch. Med. Wochenschr.
pages=1948–9
*Citation
id = PMID:13049881
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/13049881
last=BUESS
first=H
publication-date=1953 Feb
year=1953
title=Joh. Friedrich Miescher and the contribution of Basle physicians to the biology of the nineteenth century.
volume=25
issue=4
periodical=The Yale journal of biology and medicine
pages=250–61
*cite journal
author = Miescher, Friedrich
title = Ueber die chemische Zusammensetzung der Eiterzellen
journal = Med.-Chem. Unters.
year = 1871
volume = 4
issue =
pages = 441–460
doi =
url =
*cite journal
author = Jesse P. Greenstein
title = Friedrich Miescher, 1844-1895
journal = The Scientific Monthly
year = 1943
volume = 57
issue = 5
pages = 523–532
doi =
url =http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0096-3771%28194312%2957%3A6%3C523%3AFM1%3E2.0.CO%3B2-8
* Meyer Friedman and Gerald W. Friedland, "Medicine's 10 Greatest Discoveries", ISBN 0-300-08278-9, pp.194-196.

External links

* [http://vlp.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/people/data?id=per340 Short biography and bibliography] in the Virtual Laboratory of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
* [http://www.fmi.ch/ FMI - Friedrich Miescher Institute]
* [http://www.fml.tuebingen.mpg.de/ The Friedrich Miescher Laboratory of the Max Planck Society]
* [http://www.laskerfoundation.org/rprimers/gnn/timeline/1869a Lasker Foundation]
* [http://www.fmi.ch/members/marilyn.vaccaro/ewww/dna.pioneer.excerpt.htm FMI - DNA Pioneers and Their Legacy by Ulf Lagerkvist]
*cite journal
journal=American Scientist
title=The First Discovery of DNA
url=http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/2008/4/the-first-discovery-of-dna
date=July-August 2008
last=Dahm |first=Ralf