Erwin Chargaff
| Erwin Chargaff | |
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Erwin Chargaff
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| Born |
August 11, 1905 Czernowitz, Duchy of Bukovina, Austria-Hungary |
| Died | June 20, 2002 (aged 96) New York City, United States |
| Nationality | American (since 1940) |
| Fields | Biochemistry |
| Institutions | Yale University (1925–1930), University of Berlin (1930–1933), Pasteur Institute (1933–1934), Columbia University (1935–1974), Roosevelt Hospital (1974–1992) |
| Education | Maximiliansgymnasium, Vienna |
| Alma mater | Vienna College of Technology (1924–1928) |
| Doctoral advisor | Fritz Feigl |
| Doctoral students | Seymour S. Cohen, David Sprinson, Boris Magasanik |
| Known for | Chargaff's rules |
| Notable awards | Pasteur Medal (1949), National Medal of Science (1974) |
| Spouse | Vera Broido (m. 1928; d. 1995) |
| Children | Thomas Chargaff |
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Erwin Chargaff (11 August 1905 – 20 June 2002) was an Austro-Hungarian biochemist who immigrated to the United States during the Nazi era and was a professor of biochemistry at Columbia University medical school. Through careful experimentation, Chargaff discovered two rules that helped lead to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA.
The first rule was that in DNA the number of guanine units are merely equal to the number of cytosine units, and the number of adenine units are merely equal to the number of thymine units. This hinted at the base pair makeup of DNA.
The second rule was that the relative amounts of guanine, cytosine, adenine and thymine bases varies from one species to another. This hinted that DNA rather than protein could be the genetic material.
Chargaff was born on 11 August 1905 in Czernowitz, Duchy of Bukovina, Austria-Hungary, which is now Chernivtsi, Ukraine.
At the outbreak of World War I, his family moved to Vienna, where he attended the Maximiliansgymnasium (now the Gymnasium Wasagasse). He then went on to the Vienna College of Technology (Technische Hochschule Wien) where he met his future wife Vera Broido.
From 1924 to 1928, Chargaff studied chemistry in Vienna, and earned a doctorate working under the direction of Fritz Feigl.
He married Vera Broido in 1928. Chargaff had one son, Thomas Chargaff.
From 1925 to 1930, Chargaff served as the Milton Campbell Research Fellow in organic chemistry at Yale University, but he did not like New Haven, Connecticut. Chargaff returned to Europe, where he lived from 1930 to 1934, serving first as the assistant in charge of chemistry for the department of bacteriology and public health at the University of Berlin (1930–1933) and then, being forced to resign his position in Germany as a result of the Nazi policies against Jews, as a research associate at the Pasteur Institute in Paris (1933–1934).
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