Martin Evans

Sir Martin John Evans FRS (born 1 January 1941) is a British scientist, credited with discovering how to culture embryonic stem cells in 1981, and for his work in the development of the knockout mouse and the related technology of gene targeting.^[1][2] In 2007, he was a co-winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in recognition of his gene targeting work.^[3]

He is married and has one daughter and two sons.^[4] His wife Judith Evans (granddaughter of Christopher Williams) was awarded an MBE for her services to practice nursing in 1993.^[5]

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Career

• 1963 - Graduated from Christ's College, University of Cambridge.^[2]

• 1969 - Gained PhD at University College London.^[2][6]

• 1966-1978 - Lecturer at the Anatomy and Embryology department at University College London - research work, and taught PhD students and undergraduate students.^[6]

• 1978-1999 - Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge. Work in association with Matthew Kaufman began 1980.^[2]

• 1999-present - Professor of Mammalian Genetics and Director of the School of Biosciences, Cardiff University.^[2][7]

Awards

• 11 March 1993 - Fellow of the Royal Society.^[8]

• 1998 - Founder Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences.^[7][9]

• 3 May 1999 - The USA charity March of Dimes awarded their annual prize in Developmental Biology for research into embryonic growth jointly to Professor Richard Gardner of Oxford University and Evans.^[10]

• 21 September 2001 - Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research, jointly with Mario Capecchi and Oliver Smithies.^[11][4][12]

• 2002 - Honorary doctorate from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, USA.^[7][13]

• 1 January 2004 - Knighthood (Queen’s New Years Honours) for his services to medical science.^[2]
• 19 July 2005 - Honorary doctorate from the University of Bath, England.^[14]

• 8 October 2007 - Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, jointly with Mario Capecchi and Oliver Smithies.^[3]

Stem cell research

In 1981, Evans and Matt Kaufman published results for experiments in which they isolated embryonic stem cells from mouse blastocysts and grew them in cell culture.^[15] This was also achieved by Gail R. Martin, independently, in the same year.^[16] The availability of these cultured stem cells eventually made possible the introduction of specific gene alterations into the germ line of mice and the creation of transgenic mice. There's a period that Evans worked in the Whitehead Institute at MIT[1].

Evans and his collaborators showed that they could introduce a new gene into cultured embryonic stem cells and then use such genetically transformed cells to make chimeric embryos ^[17]. In some chimeric embryos, the genetically altered stem cells produced gametes, thus allowing transmission of the artificially induced mutation into future generations of mice.^[18] Transgenic mice with induced mutations in the enzyme Hypoxanthine-guanine phosphoribosyltransferase (HPRT) were created.^[19] The HPRT mutations were produced by retroviral insertion, but it was proposed that by taking advantage of genetic recombination between the normal HPRT gene and an artificial gene sequenced added to the cultured embryonic stem cells, "it may also eventually be possible to produce specific alterations in endogenous genes through homologous recombination with cloned copies modified in vitro". The production of transgenic mice using this proposed approach was accomplished in the laboratories of Oliver Smithies,^[20] and also of Mario Capecchi.^[21]

References