Edward Lawrie Tatum (December 14, 1909 – November 5, 1975) was an American geneticist. He shared half of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958 with George Wells Beadle for showing that genes control individual steps in metabolism. The other half of that year's award went to Joshua Lederberg.

Beadle and Tatum's key experiments involved exposing the bread mold Neurospora crassa to x-rays, causing mutations. In a series of experiments, they showed that these mutations caused changes in specific enzymes involved in metabolic pathways. These experiments, published in 1941, led them to propose a direct link between genes and enzymatic reactions, known as the "one gene, one enzyme" hypothesis.

Tatum went on to study genetics in bacteria. An active area of research in his laboratory was to understand the basis of Tryptophan biosynthesis in Escherichia coli. Later, Tatum and his student Joshua Lederberg showed that E. coli could share genetic information through recombination.

Tatum mentored many students who later became prominent geneticists. Aside from Joshua Lederberg, Tatum also mentored Esther M. Lederberg, née Esther M. Zimmer. Esther differed from her well -known husband in that she was considered a genius in the lab! Esther was the one who implemented replica plating. Esther discovered lambda bacteriophage, Fertility factor F, and with others, discovered transduction and specialized transduction. For an anecdote about Esther Lederberg and Ed. Tatum, see ref.^[1]

Tatum was born in Boulder, Colorado. He attended college at the University of Chicago and received his PhD in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1934. Starting in 1937, he worked at Stanford University, where he began his collaboration with Beadle. He then moved to Yale University in 1945 where he mentored Lederberg. He returned to Stanford in 1948 and then joined the faculty of Rockefeller Institute in 1957. A heavy cigarette smoker, he died in New York City of heart failure complicated by chronic emphysema.

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Nobel Lectures, Physiology or Medicine 1942–1962, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1964
• Biographical Memoirs: National Academy of Sciences, Volume 59, National Academy Press, 1990

External links[link]

• Nobel biography

Lawrie Tatum (Mullica Hill, New Jersey May 22, 1822 - January 22, 1900 Springdale, Iowa) was a Quaker who was best known as an Indian Agent to the Kiowa and Comanche tribes at Fort Sill agency in Indian Territory.

He was born to Quaker parents George and Lydia Tatum near Mullica Hill, New Jersey in 1822 and moved to Goshen, Ohio in 1831 followed by a move to Cedar County, Iowa in 1844.

When President Ulysses S. Grant's "Peace Policy" concerning U.S. policy with Native American tribes went into effect, officials of the Society of Friends (Quakers) met with Grant and requested members of their sect be assigned as Indian agents. This led to the "Quaker Policy"; replacing corrupt agents in the Indian Bureau with Quakers, which was later expanded to include other religious denominations.^[1] On July 1, 1869, Tatum began his duties "acting in the capacity of governor, legislature, judge, sheriff and accounting officer" for the Kiowa and Comanche Agency at Fort Sill in the Indian Territory.

Tatum was known to the Kiowa and Comanche tribes as Pot-ta-wat Pervo (Bald Head Agent). While acting as Indian agent, Tatum secured the release of many white and Mexican captives, including the family of Gottfried Koozer, whose wife and five children were kidnapped by Chief White Horse of the Kiowa. Tatum resigned his position on March 31, 1873 partly in protest to the release of Satanta, which he opposed.^[2]

In 1884, he was appointed guardian to future United States president Herbert Hoover and Hoover's brother Theodore and sister Mary after the death of their mother.^[3][4]

Lawrie Tatum's Bibliography[link]

Our Red Brothers and the Peace Policy of President Ulysses S. Grant (1899)

References[link]

1. ^ The Western American Indian: Case Studies in Tribal History By Richard N. Ellis
2. ^ Our red brothers and the peace policy of President Ulysses S. Grant By Lawrie Tatum Publisher: John C. Winston & Co. Philadelphia Pa.
3. ^ The Making of Herbert Hoover By Rose Wilder Lane p. 106
4. ^ Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum