VOLUME 12, NUMBER 14 • JANUARY 26, 2001

Stillman to discuss chromosome inheritance next week

Bruce Stillman, director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, is next week’s Friday lecturer.

Bruce Stillman, director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, will present the Friday lecture next week (Feb. 2). Stillman’s topic will be "Chromosome Inheritance."

Stillman’s research focuses on the mechanism and regulation of DNA in eukaryotes, a process that ensures accurate inheritance of genetic material from one cell generation to the next. He has contributed to the elucidation of the mechanism of DNA replication of human adenovirus DNA and the mechanism of replication of DNA virus 40 genome. The latter research led to the discovery of many DNA replication proteins that function to replicate the human genome.

In addition to this work, Stillman studies Saccharomyces cerevisiae. His laboratory has elucidated the fine structure of chromosomal origins of DNA replication and identified proteins that bind to these sequences. One of these is the initiator protein called the Origin Recognition Complex, which facilitates initiation of chromosome DNA replication.

A native of Australia, Stillman received his Ph.D. at the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University. He then moved to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory as a postdoctoral fellow in 1979 and has been at the laboratory ever since, having been promoted to the scientific staff in 1981. Stillman has been director of the Cancer Center at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory since 1992, a position he still holds. In 1994, he succeeded James D. Watson as director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.

For his accomplishments, Stillman has received a number of honors, including election as a Fellow of The Royal Society in 1993. In 1994, he was awarded the Julian Wells Medal by the Australian Society of Molecular Biology, and in 1995, he was elected a Charter Fellow of the Molecular Medicine Society. In 1999, Stillman was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia for service to scientific research in the field of molecular biology. He was also elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.

Stillman is a past recipient of research awards from the Damon Runyon-Walter Winchell Cancer Research Fund and the Rita Allen Foundation. In addition, he is a member of the editorial boards of a number of scientific journals, is a former chair of the Experimental Virology Study Section of the National Institutes of Health and is a member of a number of academic societies. Stillman is a member of the Scientific Advisory Boards of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in the U.K., The M.I.T. Cancer Center, the Albert Einstein College of Medicine Cancer Center, the Australian National University, Tularik, Inc., Rosetta Inpharmatics and Merck and Co. He is also co-chair of the Board of Scientific Councilors of the National Cancer Institute.

Stillman’s talk on Feb. 2 begins at 3:45 p.m. in Caspary Auditorium and is preceded by a tea in Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Lounge at 3:15 p.m. All are welcome.