Retroviruses and Oncogenes II (Nobel Lecture)

✍ Scribed by Prof. J. Michael Bishop

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1990
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 984 KB
• Volume: 29
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0044-8249
• DOI: 10.1002/anie.199007161

✦ Synopsis

The suggestion that genetic changes might be responsible for cancer was long controversial. The joint results of Harold E. Varmus and J. Michael Bishop, obtained over many years, lent much support to this idea and led to the award of the Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology in 1989. Their interest in oncogenes and retroviruses opened up some of the most interesting areas in modern biology: the genetic basis of cancer, the transposition of DNA through RNA intermediates, the control of gene expression in eukaryotes, and the molecular basis of evolution. Their work takes on additional importance in light of the worldwide spread of a human retrovirus, HIV, which causes AIDS. The two articles give an overview of the history of research in this area and lead the reader to topics of current interest.