"Boyer and Cohen could take a piece of DNA and splice it into a plasmid."
(“Stanley Cohen and Herbert Boyer," Youtube, 27 Feb. 2009)
Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen
Catalysts of GMO Technology
("DNA Double Helix," n.d.)
"That was another eureka moment. Bob Helling, a fellow graduate student of mine from the University of Pittsburgh who was doing a sabbatical in my lab, and I went to look at the gels in the darkroom, and there it was. It actually brought tears to my eyes, it was so exciting, and I knew what we had done had a lot of potential."
~ Dr. Herbert Boyer, Biochemist (Gitschier, "Wonderful Life," Sept. 2009)
Transferring Between Species
After discovering the process of recombinant DNA in early 1973, Boyer and Cohen continued their research. They began to work with more complicated plasmids, altering the tetracycline-resistant plasmid with kanamycin-resistant plasmids. They discovered that genetic materials could be transferred between species, a groundbreaking discovery in 1973 that disproved prior theories (“Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen”).
"It had been thought previously that hybrid creatures can’t be made. It was questionable whether genes could be copied by transplanting them into another species of cells. Our experiments show that it was possible to attach virtually any DNA to a plasmid and have the plasmid reproduce the DNA that was attached to it."
~ Dr. Stanley Cohen, Geneticist and Biochemist (PNAS, Science Sessions Podcasts, 18 Dec. 2023)
Dr. Cohen at Stanford
(Jones, Medium, 12 Nov. 2015)
Boyer and Cohen were the first scientists to successfully genetically modify a cell. The U.S. government awarded them the first biotechnology patent in 1980 (“Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen").
In 1978 Boyer founded Genentech, one of the first biotechnology companies, which genetically modified bacteria to produce insulin and other human proteins (Lynas 60). This played a large role in the creation of the modern biotechnology industry (“Professor Herbert Boyer”). Cohen continued his career in research. At 89, he is currently working on Covid-19 research at Stanford.
"Recombinant DNA patent, autographed by Stanley Cohen
and Herbert Boyer"
(A Half Century of Pioneering Innovation, Stanford Office of Technical Licensing, 2020)
Boyer and Cohen’s work created a gateway for many future opportunities and scientific discoveries. Their process of modifying DNA is still being used today.