{{Short description|American geneticist (1909–1975)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=November 2025}} {{Infobox scientist | image =Edward Lawrie Tatum nobel.jpg | image_size = | caption = |birth_name = Edward Lawrie Tatum | birth_date = December 14, 1909 | birth_place = Boulder, Colorado, U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1975|11|05|1909|12|14}} | death_place = New York City, U.S. | field = Genetics | alma_mater = University of Chicago <br> University of Wisconsin–Madison | work_institution = Stanford University <br> Yale University <br> Rockefeller Institute | doctoral_advisor = | doctoral_students = {{ublist|Joshua Lederberg|Carolyn Slayman}} | notable_students = Esther M. Lederberg | known_for = Gene regulation of biochemical events within cells | prizes = Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine | footnotes = }}
'''Edward Lawrie Tatum''' (December 14, 1909 – November 5, 1975) was an American geneticist. He shared half of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1958 with George Beadle for showing that genes control individual steps in metabolism. The other half of that year's award went to Joshua Lederberg.<ref name="Joshua"/> Tatum was an elected member of the United States National Academy of Sciences,<ref name="NAS"/> the American Philosophical Society,<ref name="APS"/> and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.<ref name="AAAS"/>
==Education== Edward Lawrie Tatum was born on December 14, 1909, in Boulder, Colorado<ref name="Lederberg">{{cite journal |last1=Lederberg |first1=Joshua |title=Edward Lawrie Tatum |journal=Annual Review of Genetics |date=December 1979 |volume=13 |issue=1 |pages=1–5 |doi=10.1146/annurev.ge.13.120179.000245 |pmid=395892 |language=en |issn=0066-4197|doi-access=free }}</ref> to Arthur L. Tatum and Mabel Webb Tatum. Arthur L. Tatum was a chemistry professor, who by 1925 was a professor of pharmacology at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.<ref name="Joshua"/>
Edward Lawrie Tatum attended college at the University of Chicago for two years,<ref name="McMurray">{{cite book|last1=McMurray|first1=Emily J.|last2=Kosek|first2=Jane Kelly|last3=Valade|first3=Roger M.|title=Notable Twentieth-century Scientists: S-Z|date=1995|publisher=Gale Research|isbn=0810391856|page=[https://archive.org/details/szindexes04mcmu/page/1970 1970]|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/szindexes04mcmu}}</ref> before transferring to the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he received his BA in 1931 and PhD in 1934.<ref name="Nobel">{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1958/tatum-bio.html|title=Edward Tatum - Biographical|website=www.nobelprize.org|access-date=March 3, 2018}}</ref> His dissertation was ''Studies in the biochemistry of microorganisms'' (1934).<ref name="Joshua"/> right|thumb|200x200px|''Drosophila Melanogaster'', the object of Tatum's early science
==Career== Starting in 1937, Tatum worked at Stanford University, where he began collaborating with George Beadle on their work on fruit flies (''Drosophila melanogaster''). He then moved to Yale University in 1945 where he mentored Lederberg. He returned to Stanford in 1948 and then joined the faculty of Rockefeller Institute in 1957.<ref name="Lederberg"/><ref name="Joshua"/> He remained there until his death on November 5, 1975, in New York City. A heavy cigarette smoker, Tatum died of heart failure complicated by chronic emphysema.<ref name="Joshua">{{cite journal| last=Lederberg |first=Joshua |title=Edward Lawrie Tatum 1909—1975 |url=http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/tatum-edward.pdf |journal=Biographical Memoirs |volume=59 |publisher=National Academy Press |year=1990}}</ref> His last wife Elsie Bergland died in 1998.
==Research== Tatum and Beadle carried out pioneering studies of biochemical mutations in Neurospora, published in 1941. Their work provided a prototype of the investigation of gene action<ref name="Joshua"/> and a new and effective experimental methodology for the analysis of mutations in biochemical pathways.<ref name="Lederberg"/> Beadle and Tatum's key experiments involved exposing the bread mold ''Neurospora crassa'' to x-rays, causing mutations. In a series of experiments, they showed that these mutations caused changes in specific enzymes involved in metabolic pathways. This led them to propose a direct link between genes and enzymatic reactions, known as the "one gene, one enzyme" hypothesis.<ref name="Adelberg">{{cite journal |last1=Adelberg |first1=Edward A. |title=The right place at the right time|author-link=Edward A. Adelberg |journal=Annual Review of Microbiology |date=October 1998 |volume=52 |issue=1 |pages=1–40 |doi=10.1146/annurev.micro.52.1.1 |pmid=9891792 |s2cid=2602864 |language=en |issn=0066-4227|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref name="Joshua"/><ref name="Lederberg"/><ref name="Yanofsky">{{cite journal |last1=Yanofsky |first1=C |title=The favorable features of tryptophan synthase for proving Beadle and Tatum's one gene-one enzyme hypothesis. |journal=Genetics |date=February 2005 |volume=169 |issue=2 |pages=511–6 |doi=10.1093/genetics/169.2.511 |pmid=15731515 |pmc=1449131 }}</ref>
Tatum spent his career studying biosynthetic pathways and the genetics of bacteria. An active area of research in his laboratory was to understand the basis of Tryptophan biosynthesis in ''Escherichia coli''. Tatum and his student Joshua Lederberg showed that ''E. coli'' could share genetic information through recombination.<ref name="Joshua"/><ref name="Lederberg"/>
==Awards and honors== * 1959, Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences.<ref name="AAAS">{{Cite web |title=Edward Lawrie Tatum |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/edward-lawrie-tatum |access-date=January 9, 2023 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}}</ref> * 1958, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (with George Beadle and Joshua Lederberg) for showing that genes control individual steps in metabolism. * 1957, Member, American Philosophical Society,<ref name="APS">{{Cite web |title=American Philosophical Society Member History : Edward Lawrie Tatum |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Edward+Tatum&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=January 9, 2023 |website=American Philosophical Society }}</ref> * 1952, Member, United States National Academy of Sciences,<ref name="NAS">{{Cite web |title=Edward Tatum |url=http://www.nasonline.org/member-directory/deceased-members/20000909.html |access-date=January 9, 2023 |website=National Academy of Sciences}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist}}
{{Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine Laureates 1951-1975}} {{1958 Nobel Prize winners}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tatum, Edward}} Category:1909 births Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Category:1975 deaths Category:American geneticists Category:American Nobel laureates Category:Nobel laureates in Physiology or Medicine Category:Stanford University Department of Biology faculty Category:Stanford University School of Medicine faculty Category:University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni Category:Rockefeller University faculty Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society Category:20th-century American people Category:Academics from Boulder, Colorado Category:Scientists from Boulder, Colorado Category:Academics from Chicago Category:Scientists from Chicago Category:Scientists from Madison, Wisconsin Category:Drosophilists