“We should doubtless kill an animal,” Niels Bohr’s 1932 lecture in which he
speculates about investigating the molecular basis of life: Bohr (1933).
Max Delbriick’s first published work in biology: Timoféeff-Ressovky, Zimmer,
and Delbriick (1935); for an English translation of this publication, together
with an analysis of its impact in the formative years of molecular biology,
see Sloan and Fogel (2011).
“From Delbriick’s general picture”: Erwin Schrodinger discusses Delbriick’s
ideas in Schrodinger (1944, chap. 6).
“T was absolutely overwhelmed”: Delbriick describes his first encounter with
bacterial viruses in Delbriick and Kopp (1980, p. 24).
DNA as a stupid substance: “At that time it was believed that DNA was a stupid
substance, a tetranucleotide which couldn't do anything specific,” from a
1972 interview with Max Delbriick conducted by Horace Judson and quoted
in Judson (1979, p. 59), a superb history of the origins of modern molecular
biology.
Avery and colleagues on genes being made of DNA: Avery, MacLeod, and Mc-
Carty (1944).
Hershey and Chase’s simple and elegant demonstration that the genetic mate-
rial is DNA and not protein: Hershey and Chase (1952).
“Tt has not escaped our notice,” on the double-helical structure of DNA and
speculations about the storage and copying of genetic information: Watson
and Crick (1953).
James Watson tells the story of the discovery of DNA’s structure in Watson
(1968); this famously candid book includes a photocopy of Watson’s March
1953 letter to Delbriick.
“Nobody, absolutely nobody”: Delbriick speaking to the surprising simplicity
of the genetic code in Judson (1979, p. 60).
On Delbriick’s role in the formative years of molecular biology: Fischer and
Lipson (1988).
Chapter 5
Mary Shelley’s story of Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus was originally