Alfred Hershey

Alfred Day Hershey
Alfred D. Hershey in 1969
Born	(1908-12-04)December 4, 1908 Owosso, Michigan
Died	Syosset, New York
Nationality	United States
Fields	bacteriology genetics
Alma mater	Michigan State University
Known for	Proof of DNA as genetic material of life
Notable awards	Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969

Alfred Day Hershey (December 4, 1908 – May 22, 1997) was an American Nobel Prize–winning bacteriologist and geneticist.

He was born in Owosso, Michigan and received his B.S. in chemistry at Michigan State University in 1930 and his Ph.D. in bacteriology in 1934, taking a position shortly thereafter at the Department of Bacteriology at Washington University in St. Louis.

He began performing experiments with bacteriophages with Italian-American Salvador Luria and German Max Delbrück in 1940, and observed that when two different strains of bacteriophage have infected the same bacteria, the two viruses may exchange genetic information.

He moved with his assistant Martha Chase to Cold Spring Harbor, New York, in 1950 to join the Carnegie Institution of Washington's Department of Genetics, where he and Chase performed the famous Hershey–Chase experiment in 1952. This experiment provided additional evidence that DNA, not protein, was the genetic material of life.

He became director of the Carnegie Institution in 1962 and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969, shared with Salvador Luria and Max Delbrück for their discovery on the replication of viruses and their genetic structure.

Hershey had 1 child, Peter Manning Hershey (1956-1999) with his wife Harriet (often called Jill) (1918-2000). The family was active in the social network of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories and regularly enjoyed the beach in season.

After Hershey died, another phage worker, Frank Stahl, wrote: "The Phage Church, as we were sometimes called (see Phage group), was led by the Trinity of Delbrück, Luria, and Hershey. Delbrück's status as founder and his ex cathedra manner made him the pope, of course, and Luria was the hard-working, socially sensitive priest-confessor. And Al (Hershey) was the saint."

External links

• Nobel biography
• Biographical Memoir: Alfred Day Hershey by Franklin W. Stahl for the National Academy of Sciences
• Key Participants: Alfred D. Hershey - Linus Pauling and the Race for DNA: A Documentary History