The "Genetic Program": Behind the Genesis of an Influential Metaphor
The "Genetic Program": Behind the Genesis of an Influential Metaphor
复制标题
DOI：
10.1534/genetics.115.178418
复制
发表时间：
2015-07-01
期刊：
影响因子：
3.3
通讯作者：
Peluffo, Alexandre E.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Peluffo, Alexandre E.
“遗传程序”的比喻，表明基因组是建立一个表型所需的一组指令，尽管多年来受到各种批评，但在生物学中非常有影响力。这个隐喻首次发表于1961年，被认为是在两篇不同的文章中独立发明的，一篇是恩斯特·迈尔，另一篇是弗朗索瓦·雅各布和雅克·莫诺。在这里，在详细分析了双方所指的“遗传程序”之后，我使用未发表的档案，展示了迈尔和莫诺的想法之间的强烈相似之处，并表明他们的遗传程序思想可能有着共同的起源。我探讨了这两个人在1961年之前相识的可能性，并通过分子生物学领域的共同朋友和同事交流了他们的想法。根据雅各布和莫诺未发表的信件，我强调了影响他们有影响力的论文的准备的重要事件，该论文介绍了遗传程序的概念。最后，我认为遗传程序的比喻可能早于这两篇论文，而且它可能在1961年之前被非正式地使用。
The metaphor of the "genetic program," indicating the genome as a set of instructions required to build a phenotype, has been very influential in biology despite various criticisms over the years. This metaphor, first published in 1961, is thought to have been invented independently in two different articles, one by Ernst Mayr and the other by Francois Jacob and Jacques Monod. Here, after a detailed analysis of what both parties meant by "genetic program," I show, using unpublished archives, the strong resemblance between the ideas of Mayr and Monod and suggest that their idea of genetic program probably shares a common origin. I explore the possibility that the two men met before 1961 and also exchanged their ideas through common friends and colleagues in the field of molecular biology. Based on unpublished correspondence of Jacob and Monod, I highlight the important events that influenced the preparation of their influential paper, which introduced the concept of the genetic program. Finally, I suggest that the genetic program metaphor may have preceded both papers and that it was probably used informally before 1961.