Dr. David Baulcombe Professor of Botany at Cambridge University and Royal Society Research Professor “The Biogenesis and Roles of Small Silencing RNAs ”

Dr. Baulcombe is best known for his work on RNA silencing mechanisms. His group identified many components of the RNA silencing machinery. A key discovery was the short RNAs that are the specificity determinant. However, he has wide interests in plant molecular biology. He has researched the effects of plant hormones on gene expression and pioneered the use of genetic modification to develop virus-resistant crop plants. Currently he works on RNA-silencing systems that protect against viruses and mobile elements of DNA. David's work in this area has emphasised the importance of plants as model systems for basic biology because his findings are relevant to RNA interference in animals and they have direct implications for biomedicine. His recent interests have focused on RNA silencing and its effects on growth, development and evolution in addition to roles in defense. The recent work in David’s group embraces a systems level analysis of RNA silencing and its influences – direct or indirect – on gene expression.
David’s career started as an undergraduate in the Botany Department at Leeds University and until this month he was a senior research scientist in the Sainsbury Laboratory, Norwich. He has just taken a new position as Professor of Botany at Cambridge University and Royal Society Research Professor. In the early part of his career he did a PhD in Edinburgh, postdoc stints in Montreal and Athens, (Georgia) and he was a project leader at the Plant Breeding Institute in Cambridge. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and a foreign associate member of the US National Academy of Sciences. When not in the lab he enjoys sailing, hill walking and music.

A reception in the Jordan Hall atrium will follow the lecture.

THE SONNEBORN LECTURES

Friends of the late Tracy M. Sonneborn have established a lectureship in his memory. This is the 27th year of the lectureship.

Aside from a few years at Johns Hopkins University where he received the Ph.D. degree, Tracy Sonneborn spent his entire career at Indiana University. His devotion to the study of Paramecium established him as the world leader in biology and genetics of the Protozoa; indeed it is no exaggeration to say that he founded the modern era of study in these areas. One of his major contributions was in demonstrating that preexisting structures in cells can repeatedly determine the patterns of new structures through many generations. Although recognized as an important exception to Mendelian inheritance and a critical element in prion diseases, the mechanism of structural inheritance in biology is not yet understood. “Whatever the final outcome of studies of these phenomena, he must take his place among the most brilliant and devoted experimentalists in the history of biology and a true giant, like no other, in the field of protozoan research” (John Preer, http://newton.nap.edu/html/biomems/tsonneborn.html). With precision, thoroughness, and infectious enthusiasm, Tracy Sonneborn also contributed unstintingly to teaching at Indiana University. In spite of the many attempts to entice him away, he remained loyal to IU, finding here the environment he thought was best. To honor his contributions to science and his outstanding career Tracy Sonneborn’s friends and colleagues initiated the Sonneborn Lectureship 25 years ago. (For more information on Dr. Sonneborn, read John Preer’s essay and his 2006 commentary in Genetics 172: 1373-1377).

Support for this lecture has been provided by the Sonneborn Lecture Fund, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Department of Biology.

PREVIOUS SONNEBORN LECTURES

1981 Charles Yanofsky
1982 Donald D. Brown
1983 Philip Leder
1984 Gerald R. Fink
1985 David S. Hogness
1986 Mark Ptashne
1987 David Botstein
1988 Franklin Stahl
1989 Ira Herskowitz
1990 Thomas R. Cech
1991 Elizabeth H. Blackburn
1992 Melvin I. Simon
1993 Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard
1994 Christine Guthrie
1995 Gerald M. Rubin
1996 Lucy Shapiro
1997 Randy W. Schekman
1998 Jim Forney, Eric Meyer, Meng-Chao Yao and John Preer
1999 John Kilmartin
2000 Elliot Meyerowitz
2001 David M. Prescott
2002 Phillip Hanawalt
2003 Sharon Long
2005 Cynthia Kenyon
2006 J. Richard McIntosh

THE COMMITTEE FOR THE 2007 SONNEBORN LECTURE

Roger Innes
Thomas Kaufman
William Saxton
Miriam Zolan