"Genetic Control of Biochemical Reactions in Neurospora." Reprinted from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume 27, no. 11, November 1941, pp. 499-506. ONE GENE-ONE ENZYME.

Pp. 499-506. Stapled, as issued. Pencil notes (erasable) on first page (see photo). Soiled throughout, with a larger stain in left margin of p. 502 (see photo). Good. First Separate Edition. Copy of the important geneticist Guido Pontecorvo (with his ink signature "G. Pontecorvo" on the first page). Garrison and Morton 254.3. The one gene-one enzyme hypothesis is implicit in this paper and is the reason why this is a landmark publication in biochemical genetics (see photo of one paragraph on p. 505). But the exact wording "one gene-one-enzyme" is not in this paper, contrary to the impression some have. Quoting Norman Horowitz in his biographical memoir of George Beadle: "Beadle summarized the whole field of biochemical genetics in an historic article in Chemical Reviews (1945,4). He proposed that the biochemical actions of genes could be explained by assuming that genes are responsible for enzyme specificity, the relation being that 'a given enzyme will usually have its final specificity set by one and only one gene. The same is true of other unique proteins, for example, those functioning as antigens.' This statement became known as the 'one gene-one enzyme' hypothesis of gene action and is Beadle's major legacy to fundamental genetics. Controversial at first (the controversy itself is an interesting reflection on the state of genetics at the time), it was eventually proved to be correct." The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958 was divided, one half jointly to George Wells Beadle and Edward Lawrie Tatum "for their discovery that genes act by regulating definite chemical events" and the other half to Joshua Lederberg "for his discoveries concerning genetic recombination and the organization of the genetic material of bacteria.".…