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Jan 1, 1000
Abu al-Qasim first describes the hereditary nature of haemophilia
Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi (also known as Albucasis) is the first physician to describe the hereditary nature of haemophilia in his Al-Tasrif. -
Period: Jan 1, 1000 to
Plant systematics and hybridization
The study of plant breeds contributes much to the understanding of inheritance. -
Erasmus Darwin publishes early ideas on evolution
Erasmus Darwin writes Zoonomia; or the Laws of Organic Life, in which he asks "shall we conjecture that one and the same kind of living filament is and has been the cause of all organic life?" -
Lamarck proposes his theory on the transmutation of species
Jean Baptiste Lamarck proposes his theory on the transmutation of species in his Philosophie Zoologique. -
Darwin publishes his theory of evolution
Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species, proposing his general theory of evolution. -
Period: to
Classical genetics
Mendelian genetics becomes accepted and the search for the molecular basis of inheritance begins. -
Mendel describes the genetics of pea plants
Gregor Johann Mendel presents his paper describing his now-famous experiments on the hybridisation of pea plants. Mendel performed thousands of experiments to trace inheritance patterns of certain traits in pea plants. His results showed that the inheritance of particular traits (such as flower colour) obeyed simple statistical rules. Mendel's work was only widely accepted after his death, and it took until the early 20th century for its importance to be recognised. -
Friedrich Miescher discovers DNA in the nuclei of cells
Friedrich Miescher discovers nuclein, a weak acid in the nuclei of white blood cells, which we today know as DNA. -
De Vries proposes the concept of genes
Hugo de Vries postulates that "inheritance of specific traits in organisms comes in particles", naming such particles "(pan)genes". -
Bateson coins the word genetics
William Bateson, a supporter of Mendel's work, coins the word genetics. -
Morgan proposes that genes are on chromosomes
Thomas Hunt Morgan argues that genes are on chromosomes, based on observations of a sex-linked white eye mutation in fruit flies. -
Alfred Sturtevant maps the first chromosome
Alfred Sturtevant makes the first genetic map of a chromosome. -
Griffith discovers a "transforming principle" in dead bacteria (DNA)
Frederick Griffith discovers that dead bacteria can transfer genetic material to "transform" other still-living bacteria. -
Brachet shows DNA is found in chromosomes
Jean Brachet shows that DNA is found in chromosomes and that RNA is present in the cytoplasm of all cells. -
Central dogma of genetics established: genes code for proteins
Edward Lawrie Tatum and George Wells Beadle show that genes code for proteins; the original central dogma of genetics is established. -
Hämmerling establishes the role of the nucleus in storing genetic information
The role of the nucleus as the respository of genetic information in eukaryotes is established by Hämmerling in his work on the single celled alga Acetabularia. -
"Transforming principle" identified as DNA
Oswald Theodore Avery, Colin McLeod and Maclyn McCarty identify the "transforming principle" as DNA. -
Period: to
DNA era
Molecular basis of inheritance is understood and molecular biology techniques are developed and refined. -
Chargaff shows that general rules apply to the nucleotides in DNA
Erwin Chargaff shows that the four nucleotides are not present in nucleic acids in stable proportions, but that some general rules appear to hold (e.g., that the amount of adenine, A, tends to be equal to that of thymine, T). -
Hershey-Chase experiment confirms DNA as the carrier of genetic information
The Hershey-Chase experiment confirms that the genetic information of viruses that infect bacteria (and all other organisms) is DNA. -
Structure of DNA solved
James D. Watson and Francis Crick determined the structure of DNA, using the X-ray crystallography work of Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins. -
Meselson-Stahl show DNA replication is semiconservative
The Meselson-Stahl experiment demonstrates that DNA is semiconservatively replicated. -
First letter of genetic code cracked
First letter of the genetic code deciphered by Marshall Nirenberg and Johann Matthaei. -
Genetic code cracked
All 64 RNA three-letter code words (codons) for all 20 amino acids have been identified. -
First gene sequence
Walter Fiers and his team at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology of the University of Ghent, Belgium, determine the first gene sequence. -
Memes invented
Richard Dawkins publishes his book The Selfish Gene, coining the word meme to describe "an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture", the cultural analogue to a gene in that memes self-replicate, mutate, and respond to selective pressures. -
First genome sequenced (bacteriophage Φ-X174)
First whole genome sequence determined by Fred Sanger's lab: bacteriophage Φ-X174. -
First complex genome sequenced
First genome sequence for a multicellular organism: Caenorhabditis elegans. -
Period: to
Post-genomics era
Genome sequencing is commonplace and the race is on to make sense of the vast amounts of genetic information we now have access to. -
First draft of human genome
First draft sequences of the human genome are released simultaneously by the Human Genome Project and Celera Genomics. -
Human genome fully sequenced
Successful completion of the Human Genome Project announced with a reported 99% of the human genome sequenced with 99.99% accuracy.
