IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB766326866

Remembering Our Forebears: Albert Jan Kluyver and the Unity of Life (2017)

David R. Singleton (Author)
Singleton, Rivers, Jr. (Author)

Journal of the History of Biology
Volume: 50
Issue: 1
Pages: 169-218

DOI: 10.1007/s10739-016-9438-7

URI: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10739-016-9438-7

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Academia.edu

Evolution Biochemistry Chemistry Microbiology 20th century 19th century Kluyver, Albert Jan Kluyver, A. J.

The Dutch microbiologist/biochemist Albert Jan Kluyver (1888–1956) was an early proponent of the idea of biochemical unity, and how that concept might be demonstrated through the careful study of microbial life. The fundamental relatedness of living systems is an obvious correlate of the theory of evolution, and modern attempts to construct phylogenetic schemes support this relatedness through comparison of genomes. The approach of Kluyver and his scientific descendants predated the tools of modern molecular biology by decades. Kluyver himself is poorly recognized today, yet his influence at the time was profound. Through lens of today however, it has been argued that the focus by Kluyver and others to create taxonomic and phylogenetic schemes using morphology and biochemistry distorted and hindered progress of the discipline of microbiology, because of a perception that the older approaches focused too much on a reductionist worldview. This essay argues that in contrast the careful characterization of fundamental microbial metabolism and physiology by Kluyver made many of the advances of the latter part of the twentieth century possible, by offering a framework which in many respects anticipated our current view of phylogeny, and by directly and indirectly training a generation of scientists who became leaders in the explosive growth of biotechnology.

...More

Citation URI

https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB766326866/

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Article Rivers, Singleton, Jr.; (2000)
From Bacteriology to Biochemistry: Albert Jan Kluyver and Chester Werkman at Iowa State (/isis/citation/CBB000111925/)

Article Deichmann, Ute; (2009)
Chemistry and the Engineering of Life around 1900: Research and Reflections by Jacques Loeb (/isis/citation/CBB001230120/)

Book Sapp, Jan; (2009)
The New Foundations of Evolution: On the Tree of Life (/isis/citation/CBB000952774/)

Article Johnstone, Rose; (2003)
A Sixty-Year Evolution of Biochemistry at McGill University (/isis/citation/CBB000650275/)

Article Carlos Ramírez; (2022)
Lipids, Chloroform, and Their Intertwined Histories (/isis/citation/CBB384618008/)

Article Brockwell, John; Sprent, Janet I.; Day, David A.; (2013)
Fraser John Bergersen 1929--2011 (/isis/citation/CBB001211868/)

Article Hans-Jürgen Apell; (2018)
Finding Na,K-ATPase: I - From Cell to Molecule (/isis/citation/CBB428130959/)

Article Müller-Wille, Staffan; (2007)
Hybrids, Pure Cultures, and Pure Lines: From Nineteenth-Century Biology to Twentieth-Century Genetics (/isis/citation/CBB000831420/)

Article Long, Tulley; (2009)
William McElroy, the McCollum-Pratt Institute, and the Transformation of Biology at Johns Hopkins, 1945--1960 (/isis/citation/CBB000932537/)

Article Kragh, Helge; (2009)
Uorganisk darwinisme---Udviklingstanken i de fysiske videnskaber (/isis/citation/CBB001022218/)

Book John L. Ingraham; (2017)
Kin: How We Came to Know Our Microbe Relatives (/isis/citation/CBB018554027/)

Book Lagerkvist, Ulf; (2005)
The Enigma of Ferment: From the Philosopher's Stone to the First Biochemical Nobel Prize (/isis/citation/CBB000610395/)

Article Sourkes, Theodore L.; (2004)
The Discovery of Lecithin, the First Phospholipid (/isis/citation/CBB000740503/)

Article Wendt, Diane; (2010)
The Man with a Fish on His Back: Science, Romance, and Repugnance in the Selling of Cod-Liver Oil (/isis/citation/CBB001021093/)

Article Schwenke, Klaus Dieter; (2007)
Vom Eyweiß zum Protein: Zur Geschichte eines Begriffs (/isis/citation/CBB000900099/)

Book Kirschke, Martin; (2001)
Liebigs Lehrer Karl W. G. Kastner (1783-1857): Eine Professorenkarriere in Zeiten naturwissenschaftlichen Umbruchs (/isis/citation/CBB000101522/)

Article Marc Henry; (2021)
Thermodynamics of Life (/isis/citation/CBB851479700/)

Article Pechenkin, Alexander; (2009)
On the Origin of the Belousov--Zhabotinsky Reaction (/isis/citation/CBB001230121/)

Article Pittard, A. J.; Cox, G. B.; (2010)
Frank William Ernest Gibson 1923--2008 (/isis/citation/CBB001022179/)

Book Kaufmann, Doris; (2000)
Geschichte der Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft im Nationalsozialismus: Bestandsaufnahme und Perspektiven der Forschung (/isis/citation/CBB000110620/)

Comments

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}