This year marks 50 years of genetics at Trinity College Dublin, and to celebrate the occasion an international conference took place from the 17th-20th September in the Smurfit Institute of Genetics. The conference featured various internationally renowned geneticists speaking on topics such as neurogenetics, medical genetics and evolutionary genetics, and concluded with a public symposium in the D4 Hotels Ballsbridge.
This year marks 50 years of genetics at Trinity College Dublin, and to celebrate the occasion an international conference took place from the 17th-20th September in the Smurfit Institute of Genetics. The conference featured various internationally renowned geneticists speaking on topics such as neurogenetics, medical genetics and evolutionary genetics, and concluded with a public symposium in the D4 Hotels Ballsbridge.
Genetics is a discipline of biology that deals with the science of heredity and variation in living organisms. The modern science of genetics began with the work of Gregor Mendel in the mid-nineteenth century, and the field expanded rapidly with the groundbreaking discovery of the structure of DNA by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953. Molecular genetics then led to genetic engineering, which is used in every branch of biological research today, revolutionising society by its impact on agriculture, medicine and forensics.
The story of Trinity’s Department of Genetics begins with Professor George Dawson, a Cambridge graduate and research fellow who had taken a post in the Botany Department in 1950, but also pursued his own research in the area of bacterial genetics. He was a specialist in the field, meaning that Trinity had an early entry into this new groundbreaking science.
He persuaded the Irish Sugar Company to donate £15,000 in 1957 to support teaching and research in fundamental genetics, to help improve the crop of sugar beet that was then one of Ireland’s most important agricultural products.
This contribution allowed to establishment of the Department of Genetics in Trinity College in 1958, an important step in helping Ireland to emerge as a knowledge-based economy.
Other generous benefactors during the department’s 50 years include Chuck Feeney, the founder of American Philanthropies, and Michael Smurfit, after whom the Smurfit Institute of Genetics is named.
The Smurfit Institute of Genetics has been recognised as one of the top science research institutes in the country and ranks among the world leaders in genetics thanks to its role in research and teaching – Trinity College’s genetics and molecular biology researchers have been ranked seventh worldwide in terms of citations in other publications. Scientists from Trinity have played key roles in the analysis and sequencing of genomes (an organism’s genetic material) of bacteria, yeasts and plants, as well as participating in the Human Genome Project, an international scientific research project that identified the approximately 25,000 genes in the human genome.
Other research carried out in Trinity includes the evolution of DNA since it first emerged several billion years ago, studies of mutant genes that lead to human blindness, and the gene changes behind psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia.
Genetics is a discipline that moves extremely fast, and Trinity continues to be at the forefront of new fields. Neurogenetics, the study the role of DNA in the wiring and function of our brains, is currently one of the most exciting areas of development within genetics, and researchers in Trinity are at the forefront of these developments.
Without a doubt, the pioneering efforts of the researchers combined with the new biosciences building, due for 2010, will preserve the reputation of Trinity College’s Department of Genetics as one of the top centres for research and education.
Trinity News interviews Dr. James Watson, one of the scientists who discovered the double helix structure of DNA, in our science section, page 19.
