H.J. Muller Event | Videos

Attends CSH Symposia Genes and Chromosomes: Structure and Organization & reunites with his son David

Recommends a genetic enlightenment to produce healthier, wiser and more caring offspring

Earns PhD in Zoology from Columbia University

Born on December 21st in NYC to parents H. J. Muller, Sr., & Frances Lyons Muller

H.J. MULLER PRESENTATIONS

Introduction

—Mila Pollock

Graduates valedictorian of Morris High School (NYC) and enters Columbia University – only through the unexpected award of a scholarship, automatically granted to him on the basis of entrance examination grades

Obtains a teaching fellowship in physiology at Cornell Medical College

Earns B.A. from Columbia University

Founds a students’ biology club, which was participated in by Edgar Altenburg, & two students, Calvin Bridges & Alfred Sturtevant who had entered Columbia a year later

Begins teaching biology at the Rice Institute in Houston, invited by Julian Huxley

Becomes instructor of zoology at Columbia where he elaborates methods for quantitative mutation study

Begins working at the University of Texas, Austin as Associate Professor, teaching mainly genetics & evolution & conducting research mainly on mutation

Obtains critical evidence of the abundant production of gene mutations and chromosome changes by X-rays

Publishes findings on how X-rays produce gene mutations

Moves to Berlin, Germany, on a Guggenheim Fellowship where he worked with Timofeef-Ressovsky, Zimmer, and others. Work cut short by Hitler’s ascendance

Moves to Leningrad (Saint Petersburg), Russia, to study genetics establishes a laboratory as Senior Geneticist at the Institute of Genetics of the Academy of Sciences of the USRR. Begins study of quantitative radiation dose-frequency relations & also uses chromosomal rearrangements to study gene size and function

Moves to Moscow to continue the same work & studies as Senior Geneticist at the Institute of Genetics of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, with considerable staff of co-workers

Following the arrest of his associate Solomon Levit & rejecting the politicized genetics of the USSR, Muller enlists in the Spanish Revolution to temporarily move to Madrid, then to Paris to work in Boris Ephrussi’s lab, then visits Julian Huxley at the London Zoo, then moves to Edinburgh to work under FAE Crew, Director of the University of Edinburgh

Receives Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for showing that X-rays can induce mutations

Takes a trip around the world, visits Hiroshima & meets with Japanese emperor

Signs the Russell-Einstein Manifesto along with Max Born, Albert Einstein, Linus Pauling, Bertrand Russell & others issued at a press conference in London, England, and sent to leaders of nations that possessed nuclear weapons, or were capable of possessing them at that time.

Presents his last paper at the International Congress of Human Genetics in Chicago “What Genetic Course Will Man Steer?”

Passes away from congestive heart failure at the age of 77 in Indianapolis, Indiana