REVISED

There were several major challenges. In those days, Davenport was not an up-to-date laboratory. For example, we calculated that we poured more than 10,000 k plates in the course. I would say more than 50% of them had to be discarded because they got moldy because it was right next to the water. At high tide, the water came in and so it was moist, full of fungal spores. The other thing that was a challenge for the students was that one of the techniques we taught them was picking up spores that are about three or four microns with a microneedle. However, to keep the lab cool in a Cold Spring Harbor summer, we had the air conditioning on and the air conditioning made the microneedle vibrate, which made it virtually impossible for them to do what we were asking them to do.

Gerald Fink, geneticist, changed the field of molecular yeast biology. He is a professor of genetics at MIT, a founding member of both the Whitehead Institute and the American Cancer Society and a member of the National Academy of Sciences (1981). After receiving his Ph.D. from Yale University, he was a part of the Cornell faculty for fifteen years and also served as president of the Genetics Society of America.

In 1976, Fink’s lab succeeded in performing yeast transformation. Gerald Fink currently researches baker's yeast and explores critical pathways in cell growth and metabolism; applications include cancer research and the development of new anti-fungal drugs. He also directs a plant research group heralded for new insights into root growth and salt metabolism.

Although Fink grew up on Long Island, it was not until he attended the 1966 Symposium that he visited Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. In 1970, he began teaching the CSHL course on yeast molecular biology and continued doing so for 17 years. In 1999, he received the first honorary doctorate awarded by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.