Some Milestones in History of Science About 10,000 bce, wolves

Watson-Crick model (Meselson et al. 1958).
In 1957, Melvin Calvin, in The Path of Carbon in Photosynthesis, reported his observation of unpaired 
electron spins, i.e., free radicals, induced by light in photosynthetic systems. The carbon cycle is also
known as the Calvin cycle and was determined by using a tracer isotope of carbon-14 in combination 
with paper chromatography.
 
 

In Earl Wilbur Sutherland isolated cyclic adenosine 5'-monophosphate, or cAMP and explained how it 
is released through the binding of a hormone to the outside of a cell membrane and goes on to
perform many roles in the cell's metabolism (Sutherland 1966)
 
In 1957, David W. Talmadge modified Jerne's hypothesis, giving it a cellular orientation, so that
lymphocytes, that is, receptor-carrying cells, rather than serum, served as the source of
immunological memory and selection (Talmadge 1957). Independently, Burnet seems to have arrived 
at the same revision. The essence of this theory is fourfold: Each clone is produced somatically by
genetic hypermutation; each clone produces antibodies which have the ability to react
immunologically with a very small number of chemical configurations on the surface of an antigen; the 
immune system is able to distinguish self from non-self; and self-tolerance is set up early in life by the 
elimination of self-reactive lymphocytes (Burnet 1957). 
[revised 02/01/03] 
In 1957, Feynman and Murray Gell-Mann  proposed a law tying together the weak interactions at
work in strange-particle decay and in beta decay which were permitted by the previous year's Lee-
Yang-Wu proof.  When a particle decays by a weak interaction, e.g., neutron into proton or pion into
muon, one sort of wave is transformed into another sort.  The possible transformations include scalar, 
vector, axial vector, pseudoscalar, and tensor, or S, V, A, P, and T; Feynman and Gell-Mann identified 
V and A as the wave transformations produced by weak interactions.  Robert Marshak and E. C. 
George Sudarshan drew similar conclusions at about the same time (Gleick 1992:335-338; Johnson 
1999:151-153). 
 
In 1957, Bardeen,  Cooper, and John Schreiffer formulated the 'BCS theory' of superconductivity 
according to which a pair of negatively-charged electrons moving through a positively-charged elastic 
crystal lattice as a result of Coulomb forces.
In 1957, Herbert Kroemer showed theoretically that heterostructural transistors, made by laying down 
thin layers of semiconductors such as gallium arsenide, should be superior to conventional transitors
built from specially modified pieces of a single material such as silicon.
In 1957, Charles W. Misner, while evaluating Feyman's quantization of General Relativity, proved 
that "the Hamiltonian operator is zero" (Misner 1957:497).  
In 1957, Misner and Wheeler proposed that gravity is not a force but rather a manifestation of
geometry, i.e., that the entities of geometry are a kind of physical reality.  According to quantum 
'geometrodynamics,' space is multiply connected by 'wormholes' at the smallest Planck-length 
distances and therefore has a foamlike structure (Misner and Wheeler 1957:225-307).  
 
In 1957, Hugh Everett, III, proposed a "pure wave mechanics" formulation of quantum mechanics in
which the "unique relative-state" of the universe, a closed system, should be taken as coinciding with
reality (Everett 1957:454).  Reality is taken to be a composite system in which the state vector has 
many branches and "all possible [measurements] are realized every time, each in a different edition of
the universe, which is therefore continually multiplying....  There is no association of the particular 
present with any particular past (Bell 1981:133).  Each automaton, i.e., apparatus cum memory 
sequence, in each superposed 'branch' sees the world obey the familiar quantum laws, while this
'branching' corresponds to the collapse of the wave function.  Memories and records are in fact 
present phenomena" (ibid.:135-136).  If this "theory were correct..., we could safely assume that all
possible arrangements of matter and energy are represented somewhere among the infinite
ensemble of universes.  Only in a minute proportion of the total would things be arranged so precisely 
that living organisms, hence observers, arise....  In short, our universe is remarkable because we 
have selected it by our own existence" (Davies and Brown 1986:38).  Everett considered his theory a 
metatheory  to quantum mechanics.  John Stuart Bell considered "the really novel element" to be 
Everett's repudiation of the 'past,' on a par with Einstein's repudiation of absolute simultaneity 
(ibid.:118).  This has come to be known as the 'many worlds interpretation,' where each instant is a 
different world.
 
In 1957, Rudolf L. Mössbauer discovered that when the emitting nucleus of a gamma-ray photon is 
"held by strong forces in the lattice of a solid, the recoil energy is shared by all the nuclei in the lattice
[and] typically...the recoil will be negligible" (Dictionary of Physics 2000:309).
In 1957, E. Margaret Burbidge, Geoffrey R. Burbidge, William A. Fowler, and Hoyle, in "Synthesis 
of Elements in Stars," or "B
2
FH," said that "in order to explain all the features of the [element]
abundance curve, at least eight different types of synthesizing processes are demanded" (Burbidge et 
al. 1957:551): Hydrogen burning, responsible for most energy production; helium burning, responsible 
for carbon synthesis and other syntheses with the capture of additional alpha particles; alpha process,
where various elements are synthesized by the addition of alpha particles to Ne
20
;  e, or equilibrium, 
process, where under very high temperature and density the elements comprising the iron peak are
synthesized; s, or slow, process, where neutron capture with the emission of gamma radiation takes
place on a long-time scale; r, or rapid, process, where neutron captures occur quickly compared to 
beta decay; p process, where proton capture is responsible for the synthesis of proton-rich isotopes; 

and  x process, or various processes, responsible for the synthesis of deuterium, lithium, beryllium,
and boron, all unstable at the temperatures of stellar interiors.  At the same time, Alastair G. W. 
Cameron, independently, discussed many of the same topics and argued that many of these
elements are formed during fast reactions of supernova explosions.
About 1957, Martin Kruskal  developed "a coordinate system in which the structure of a black-hole 
could be described in one smooth set of equations, joining the flat spacetime far outside the hole on to
the highly curved spacetime inside without even a hint of a singularity at the Schwarzschild horizon" 
(Gribbin 1995:129).  Wormholes, which topologists call 'handles,' are continuous lines of force that
exit and re-enter the observer's world.
 
In 1957, Kees Boeke, in Cosmic View: The Universe in Forty Jumps, a book intended for children, 
illustrated what one would see by adding a zero, or power, to the scale of a square picture of two
people on a picnic blanket, moving in and out twenty times. 
In 1957, the United States government formed the Advanced Research Agency, or ARPA, in 
response to the Soviet Union's Sputnik, the first artificial satellite.
In 1957, John Backus led the team which created 'Fortran,' the Formula Translation language for the
IBM 704 computer.  
 
In 1957, Noam Chomsky, in Syntactic Structures, attacked behaviorism and proved that linquistic 
grammars are analogous to Turing machines and that both are hierarchical: word strings below
phrase structures below transformations between sentence structures. 
In 1958, R. J. Goldacre, in "Surface films, their collapse on compression, the shapes and sizes of
cells and the origin of life," proposed the possibility that amphipathic lipo-protein films at the air-water 
interface of the 'primal soup' under the stress of waves formed membrane tubes and then collapsed 
forming permeable bags "bearing many resemblances to the properties of the membranes of living
cells" (Goldacre 1958:287-288).
 
By 1958, David L. Nanney, working with ciliated protozoa, Tetrahymena, recognized the existence of 
two systems: genes and epigenetic mechanisms which regulate 'gene expression,'.
 
In 1958, Albert H. Coons , coupling antibodies to fluorescent dyes, showed experimentally that one
cell made only one antibody (Coons 1958). Later that year, Gustave J. V. Nossal and Lederberg, 
working together in Burnet's lab, verified the clonal selection theory's requirement that there could
only be one antibody type produced by any given lymphocyte; this came to be known as 'allelic
exclusion' (Nossal and Lederberg 1958). The same year, Lederberg recognized that, in the context of 
random drift, it was necessary to postulate the continuation throughout life of the diversification of
antibody-producing cells. Lederberg also postulated that two signals initiated by a single interaction
but separated in time were necessary to distinguish between inactivation of self and activation of
nonself. Further, he introduced the rhetorical dichotomy between the terms selective and instructive, 
representing respectively the clonal and template models (Lederberg 1959). Until Jerne's theory, all 
immunologists were agreed that the antigen impressed its mark on, or instructed, the antibody
producing cells.
 
In 1958, Crick enunciated the legendary 'Central Dogma': "Once information has passes into protein it 
cannot get out again. In more detail, the transfer of information from nucleic acid to nucleic acid, or
from nucleic acid to protein may be possible, but transfer from protein to protein, or from protein to
nucleic acid is impossible" (Crick 1958:153).
 
In 1958, Stein and Moore invented the automatic fraction collector and contibuted to the development
of the automated amino acid analyzer.
 
 
In 1958, F. Jacob and Wollman named and described 'episomes,' which are "circular,
extrachromosomal sequences of DNA that possess the capacity to integrate into, as well as
dissociate from, the chromosome of a cell.  They can replicate either autonomously or while inserted
within the chromosome" (Podolsky and Tauber 1997:392n24; Jacob and Wollman 1958).
 
In 1958, Hofman isolated the active ingredient of the mushroom Psilocybe and synthesized 
psilocybin, which he noted had a marked similarity to serotonin.
In 1958, Phillip W. Anderson showed that the effect in a metal of strong 'disorder,' or irregularity,
perhaps arising from a high concentration of atomic impurities, would localize all the electron wave
functions; i.e., each quantum state would be confined to a certain region, falling off exponentially with
the distance outside that region.
 
In 1958, Townes and Arthur L. Schawlow published their idea for an optical mazur, or 'laser.' 
Gordon Gould, independently, developed a similar idea.
In 1958, Jack St. Clair Kilby built the first integrated circuit.
In 1958, Ryle and colleagues found the first real evidence that the Universe is evolving.  By counting 
the numbers of galaxies of different apparent intensities, "the number of [weak] sources was found to
be about twice that expected from counts of intense sources [and thus] there appears to be a real

discrepancy between the observations and the predictions of the steady-state model" (Ryle 
1958:306).  "This [is] compatible with an evolving Universe if galaxies were more prone to undergo
violent outbursts in the remote past, when they were young" (Rees 1995:5-6).
In 1958, Cornell H. Mayer and colleagues reported the surface of Venus is around 600 degrees K.
In 1958, Eugene N. Parker proposed the 'solar wind' theory: There is a flow of atomic particles from
the Sun's corona, following from hydrodynamic equations of a million degree corona, which carries
with it magnetic field lines that form into a spiral pattern as the Sun rotates.
In 1958, Michael Polanyi, in Personal Knowledge, asserted that there is an interpretative ingredient in 
scientific knowledge. 
 
In 1958, Heisenberg, in Physics and Philosophy, wrote: "If actually all our knowledge is derived from 
perception, there is no meaning in the statement that the things 'really exist;' because if we have
perceptions of things it cannot possibly make any difference whether the things exist or do not exist. 
Therefore, to be perceived is identical with to be existing" (Heisenberg 1958:84).  
 
In 1958, Herbert Gelernter devised 'Geometry Theorem Prover' in Fortran List Processing Language. 
In 1958, a joint United States and European committee, including among its members, Backus, Alan 
Perlis, and McCarthy, was formed to create a universal programming language, 'Algorithmic
Language,' or 'Algol.'  In the course of creating Algol, Backus and Peter Naur invented 'Backus-Naur 
notation' for giving the formal definition of a programming language.  Although little used after its 
completion in 1960, Algol was the precursor of 'Pascal.' 
In 1959, R. H. Whittaker added a fifth domain, fungi, to the taxonomy of living things (Whittaker
1959). 
 
In 1959, Noel L. Warner and Aleksander Szenberg performed the experiments which led to the 
concept of T (for thymus) cells and B (for bursa in birds, but produced in the bone marrow of adult
mammals) cells (Szenberg and Warner 1962).
In 1959, Pardee, F. Jacob, and Monod published an experiment establishing a generalized model of
the synthesis of enzymes.  That this occurs in the absence of genetically determined repressors is
due to exogamous induction; that is, the immunity of lysogenic cells corresponds exactly to
inductibility and, if regulation occurs at the gene and not later in the process, then regulation is
completed at the level of the ribosome (Pardee et al. 1959).
In 1959, Edmond H. Fischer and Edwin Gerhard Krebs isolated and purified the first protein kinase 
and described 'reversible protein phosphorylation.' Protein kinase takes phosphate from adenosine
triphosphate and adds it to phosphorylase, turning it on. Another enzyme, protein phosphatase,
reverses this process, deactivating the phosphorylase (E. G. Krebs et al. 1959).
 
 
In 1959, Porter showed that the antibody molecule could be cut into three pieces by utilizing an
enzyme which cuts bonds within the peptide chain.  Of the three pieces, two would still combine with 
antigen.  These he named antigen-binding fragment, or Fab, and the third piece, crystallizable
fragment, or Fc.  The Fc region corresponds to different types of effector function.  Also, he showed 
that the whole antibody could be divided into different functional classes, i.e., IgA, IgD, etc (Porter 
1959).
 
In 1959, Gerald M. Edelman demonstrated, by using reducing agents to split sulphide bonds between
the peptide chains, that the immunoglobulin gamma G, or IgG, molecule, the most prevalent class in 
mammals, was a multi-chain structure.  This showed that the chains were a reasonable size for
determination of their amino acid sequence.  Edelman also showed that antibodies are constructed in
a modular fashion from domains, with the light chain composed of a variable and a constant domain 
and the heavy chain composed of four domains, three variable and one constant.  Furthermore, he 
showed that the variable domains share homologous regions as do the constant domains (Edelman
1959).
 
By 1959, Stein and Moore determined the amino acid sequence of pancreatic ribonuclease (RNase)
which breaks down RNA so that its components can be reused. This was the first enzyme to have its
function and structure to be completely described and confirmed that the amino acid sequence is a 
three-dimensional, chain-like structure which folds and bends in causing a catalytic reaction (Stein
and Moore 1961).
 
 
In 1959, Bengt Ingemar Samuelsson and Sune K. Bergström isolated prostaglandins. Samuelsson 
deduced the process by which arachidonic acid is converted into endoperoxides and that into
prostaglandins.
 
In 1959, Albert Bruce Sabin developed a oral, live-virus vaccine against poliomyelitus.
 
In 1959, H. Sherwood Lawrence proposed that infectious agents complex with transplantation
antigens (self + x) and triggered lymphocytes to produce a soluble, specific receptor for this complex
(Lawrence 1959).
 
In 1959, Konstantin Gringauz, employing Soviet Luniks Satellites, observed the first signs of the solar

wind.
 
In 1959, Luna III, a Soviet satellite, photographed the far side of the moon.
In 1959, James A. Van Allen, Carl E. McIlwain, and George H. Ludwig, in "Radiation Observations 
with Satellite 1958

," established the existence of geometrically trapped electrons and protons in a
belt 2000 km from the surface of the Earth.  The following year, Van Allen arranged for a rocket with a
particle detector aboard which found another radiation belt higher above the Earth.  Today, these are 
known as the inner and outer Van Allen belts.
In 1959, George B. Field, Frank D. Drake, and S. Hvatum suggested that the planet Jupiter's radio 
emission is caused by synchrotron radiation of magnetically trapped electrons.
In 1959, Robert Noyce devised a way to "mass-produce integrated circuits by etching thousands of 
transistors simultaneously onto the surface of a single silicon wafer" (Waldrop 2001:339). 
 
In 1959, students in Rochester's and McCarthy's computer programming class at the Massachusett 
Institute of Technology called elaborate switching networks for model railroads 'hacks,' and, 
tranferring the usage to programming, the designers of elaborate software solutions 'hackers.' 
(Waldrop 2001:187). 
 
In 1960, Sidney W. Fox converted amino acids into polymer proteinoid microspheres by heating
them.  They showed a wide variety of catalytic ability, albeit extremely weakly (Fox 1965:361-373).  
In 1960, Crick, Sydney Brenner, and F. Jacob predicted the existence of messenger RNA, the 
substance that gets repressed.  The latter two and Meselson soon isolated it (Brenner et al. 1961).
In 1960, F. Jacob, David Perrin, Carmen Sanchez, and Monod developed the 'operon model,' which 
showed that "the discovery of regulator and operator genes, and of repressive regulation of the
activity of structural genes, reveal that the genome contains...a coordinated program of protein
synthesis and the means of controlling its execution" (Jacob and Monod 1961:354).  The rate of 
information transfer from genes to proteins could be controlled by oscillation, that is, turned 'on' and
'off' at a specific speed.  The exogamous inducer was almost invariably the end-product so this model 
did much to popularize the notion of feedback among molecular biologists (Jacob et al. 1960).
 
In 1960, Jerne introduced the terms 'epitope' and 'paratope' to represent antigenic determinants and
antibody-combining sites, respectively (Jerne 1960:342).
In 1960, Julius Marmur and Paul Doty reported that denatured, that is, unfolded, polypeptides could
be renatured, regaining their original structure, provided that the two single strands were perfectly
complementary (Doty et al. 1960).
 
In 1960, Max Perutz and John Kendrew worked out the crystallographic structure of the oxygen-
carrying proteins, hemoglobin and myoglobin, a labor that Perutz had begun 23 years previously
(Perutz 1960; Kendrew 1960).
 
In 1960, Juan Oró, using concentrated solutions of ammonium cyanide in water, produced the
nucleotide adenine.
 
 
In 1960, Yoichiro Nambu and Giovanni Jona-Lasinio constructed a quantum field model in which the 
pion is a composite of fermion and anti-fermion of small, but non-zero, mass.  This mass is obtained 
through the spontaneous breaking of chiral symmetry.
In 1960, Wheeler showed that "a completely geometric model [could be constructed] for electricity, as
lines of force trapped in the topology of a multiply connected manifold" (Wheeler 1962b:xii).  He also 
said that elementary particles "represent a first-order correction to vacuum physics [which is the 
physics of zero-point energy at absolute 0 degrees].  That vacuum, that zero-order state of affairs, 
with its enormous densities of virtual photons and virtual positive-negative pairs and virtual 
wormholes, has to be properly described before one has a fundamental starting point for a proper
perturbation-theoretic analysis" (Wheeler 1960:129).  Perturbation theory may be applied to the study 
of the orbits of planets, in classical physics, or to calculate the energy level of molecules, in quantum 
mechanics.  
 
In 1960, Theodore H. Maiman described the first laser, which used a synthetic ruby rod as the lasing
medium.  
 
In 1960, Allan R. Sandage and Thomas A. Matthews isolated optically an intense radio source, 3C-
48, which, a couple of years later, turned out to be a 'quasar.'
In 1960, Eugene Merle Shoemaker proved that an asteroid created the 1.2-mile diameter crater near 
Flagstaff, AR, and theorized that the moon's craters had a similar origin.  This was confirmed by 
Apollo 17 in 1972.
 
In 1960, McCarthy invented a new language for AI, 'List Processor,' or 'Lisp,' in which every list
defined a recursive mathematical function, e.g., plus, which could then be nested inside other 
functions, e.g., (times (plus 2 2)(minus 5 3)) becomes (times 4 2) becomes 8. 
In 1960, Joseph Carl Robnett 'Lick' Licklider, in "Man-Computer Symbiosis," pictured "a network of 
[online 'thinking'] centers, connected to one another by wide-band communications lines and to 

individual users by leased-wire services" (Licklider, quoted in Waldrop 2001:177).  
 
In 1960,