Word: bacterium
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That suggested a possible link between the disease and planes carrying cholera-infected passengers. But a key question remained: If the cholera bacterium Vibrio cholerae were dumped from altitudes of 30,000 ft., where temperatures are below freezing, could it survive the journey to earth? Rondle and his colleagues simulated such air drops in their lab, subjecting V. cholerae to rapid freezing in droplets of water, followed by a quick thaw. Result: the durable bugs not only survived but actually flourished. Indeed the tests indicated that even a relatively small quantity of bacteria from, for example, an aircraft washbasin could...
Arber, 49, first postulated the existence of restriction enzymes in the early 1960s while studying viruses that invade bacteria. After labeling a virus with a radioactive isotope that acted as a tracer, Arber found that when the virus entered a bacterium, most of the viral DNA was destroyed...
Arber theorized that the bacterium produced a "restriction" enzyme that cut the viral DNA into smaller pieces (the host bacterium's DNA is protected from its own chemical scissors by other enzymes). Arber further proposed that the enzymes recognized and acted upon specific sites along the DNA strand...
Arber's theories were verified by Smith, 47, a former naval medical officer and member of the U.S. Public Health Service who turned to genetic research. In 1970 Smith published two classic papers that described his discovery of a restriction enzyme produced by the bacterium Hemophilus influenzae and the way it worked...
...those applications - the recombinant DNA technique - has begun to fulfill its widely her alded promise. By inserting genes into the DNA of a laboratory strain of the common intestinal bacterium E. coli, re searchers have induced the little bug to produce somatostatin, a mammalian brain hormone. Last month the bacterium manufactured synthetic human insulin, raising hopes that the hormone vital to the well-being of the world's diabetics may some day soon be available in virtually unlimited supply...