1970s – Brain Research

The 1970s, similarly to the 1960s, began with a series of new appointments. The first was Leroy Hood, a former Caltech undergraduate and graduate student (B.S. 1960, Ph.D. 1968), as assistant professor in 1970, followed by appointment of the electron microscopist and cell biologist Jean-Paul Revel as full professor. In 1971 Eric Davidson was appointed as associate professor and Richard Russell as assistant professor. In preparation for and following the opening of the newly-built Beckman Laboratory for Behavioral Biology (January, 1974) several young neuroscientists and biophysicists were appointed: Henry Lester and Jack Pettigrew (1973), John Allman and Ronald Konopka (Caltech Ph.D. 1972), for the ‘74-5 academic year, Mark Konishi and James Hudspeth (‘75-6), David van Essen (Caltech B.S. 1967, appointed for ‘76-77), and Jeremy Brockes (1978). Howard Berg (Caltech B.S. 1956) was appointed as Professor of Biology in 1979. In addition a new start in cell and molecular biology was begun by the hiring of Elias Lazarides as assistant professor in 1976, and Tom Maniatis as associate professor in 1977. The 15 new appointments in the decade were nearly balanced, however, by the retirements of Emerson, Haagen-Smit, van Harreveld, Wiersma, and Delbrück; by the deaths of Vinograd and Olds; and by the departures of Hodge, McMahon, Russell, Sinsheimer (to become chancellor of the University of California at Santa Cruz) and Wood (to chair the Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology Department at the University of Colorado).

Sinsheimer’s departure necessitated the appointment of a new Division Chair, and this position was filled by Norman Horowitz, Caltech Ph.D. 1939 (with Tyler), collaborator of Morgan’s while a student, postdoctoral fellow of Beadle’s at Stanford in the 1940s, and Caltech faculty member from 1946. Horowitz assumed the chairmanship September 1, 1977.

Among the research topics gaining new prominence in the ‘70s were, in molecular biology, electron microscopy of DNA, led by Professor of Chemistry (and later Professor Emeritus of Biology) Norman Davidson; development of automated protein sequencers by Dreyer and Hood; and the introduction of recombinant DNA technology by Maniatis. The numerous appointments of neurobiologists opened a number of new fields for the Division, from Hudspeth’s work on hair cells, to Konopka’s on circadian rhythms, van Essen’s on the visual cortex, and Konishi’s on sensory integration in owl behavior.

It was also in this decade that former faculty member Renato Dulbecco, who had been at Caltech from 1949 to 1962, was awarded the 1975 Nobel Prize, along with his former Caltech graduate student Howard Temin, and a young MIT professor (and former Dulbecco postdoctoral fellow), David Baltimore, who would later come to Caltech as its President and Professor of Biology in 1997.

Undergraduate education gained more prominence in the Division, as the number of Biology B.S. graduates took another sharp upturn. There were 210 graduates from 1970 through 1979, with one class, that of 1974, having 37 graduating biologists – still a record for the Division. 1970 was the first year women were admitted as undergraduates. This action was a result of the recommendation of an Institute committee chaired by biologist Ray Owen. The first wave of female graduates was in 1974, as the women admitted as freshman in 1970 completed their work – and 10 of the 37 biology graduates that year were women. At least one female biologist graduated even earlier, though not as a Biology major – Sharon Long entered as a sophomore transfer student in 1970, graduating in 1973 as an Independent Studies major. She became (and remains) a noted biologist, professor and dean at Stanford. A random selection of other undergraduate biologists of the ‘70s who are now well-known are James Gould, William Chia, Brian Seed, James Posakony, Thomas St. John, Ed Hedgecock, and Joe Kirschvink – Kirschvink is now a Professor in Caltech’s Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences.