- Email: [email protected]
In memoriam: Jean Brachet 1909–1988
Differentiation
Differentiation (1988) 39: 1-3
Ontogeny and Neoplasia 0 Springer-Verlag 2988
0bit uary
In memoriam: Jean Brachet 1909-1988
Jean Brachet, a man and a friend as we have known him and shall keep him in our memories, with his characteristic instruments microscope and the pipe.
- the
Jean Louis Auguste Brachet, Founder-President and Honorary Life President (from 1978) of the International Society of Differentiation, and long-term Editor of this journal, died on August 10th 1988, in the 80th year of his life, from cancer of the liver. Our sorrow can be overcome only by the admiration of his achievements, his personality, and the fulfilled life of a scientist. Jean Brachet was an outstanding scientist of this century, one of the fathers of modern cell and developmental biology, a “living legend” to many of us, who remained an active researcher until the end of his life. Born on March 19th 1909, in the small Belgian town of Etterbeek, Jean Brachet studied medicine at the Universi-
ty of Brussels (1927-1934). There, his interest in fundamental problems of cell biology first arose when he heard, in a lecture given by his professor of histology, Pol Gtrard, that enucleate portions of cytoplasm can survive and display several cellular functions for remarkable periods of time. Of similar importance to Jean Brachet’s career was the influence of his father Albert, a well-known embryology professor, and his collaborator, Albert Dalcq, who was certainly responsible for initiating Jean’s life-long preference for cytochemical methods and for suitably large cells with large nuclei, such as oocytes of various species, amoebas, and the giant unicellular green alga Acetabularia. Using the newly discovered “ Feulgen reaction”, in combination
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with methyl green-pyronine staining and nuclease digestions, Jean Brachet discovered RNA (called “ zymonucleic” or even “phytonucleic” acid at that time) as a major constituent of animal cells. Moreover, he observed that, while chromatin is generally rich in DNA (“ thymonucleic acid”), RNA is specifically enriched in certain other nuclear structures, notably the nucleoli, and that some RNA moves from the nucleus to the cytoplasm and directs protein synthesis, an important conclusion simultaneously and independently also made by T.O. Caspersson in Stockholm (J. Brachet, Arch Biol 53:207, 1941; T.O. Caspersson, Z Naturwiss 29: 33, 1941). Other important and seminal discoveries of Jean Brachet include the occurrence of DNA in chloroplasts and its involvement in chloroplast-specific RNA synthesis independent of the nucleus, the first example of transport of a protein from the cytoplasm into the nucleus, and the correlation between rounds of nuclear divisions and preceding DNA synthesis, observed in early cleavage stages of embryogenesis. In addition to leading a fruitful life as a researcher, he was also a prime motivator in the introduction of cytochemistry and the integration of morphological and biochemical approaches in cell biology. This is particularly evident from his major textbooks, which represent milestones in the progress of cell and developmental biology : Embryologie Chimique (1944), Chemical Embryology (1950), Biochemical Cytology (1957), The Biochemistry of Development (1960), The Cell (1964, six volumes, with A.E. Mirsky), Introduction to Molecular Biology (1974), and Molecular Cytology (1985). After receiving his doctoral (M.D.) degree in 1934, Jean Brachet remained as an Assistant at the University of Brussels until 1938. During this period he also worked, as a scientific visitor, in a number of other places, specifically the famous marine research laboratories of France (Roscoff and Slte), Italy (Naples), and the USA (Woods Hole). In 1937, he also visited Princeton University, as a Travelling Fellow of the Rockefeller Foundation. The following year, he was promoted to the position of “Charge de Cours” at the Science Faculty of the University of Brussels, where he became a Full Professor in 1942, a position which he retained - together with the Directorship of the Laboratory of Animal Morphology of the Universite Libre de Bruxelles in Rhode St. Genlse until 1977, when he retired from his professorial duties, although not from experimental biology. In the years after the Second World War he also lectured and studied as a guest at various other institutions, such as the Pasteur Institute (Paris, 1946), the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 1947), the Marine Biological Laboratory (Woods Hole, USA, 1947), the Medical Faculty of the University of Liege (Belgium, 1948-1949), the Rockefeller Institute (now Rockefeller University; New York, 1958), and at the Medical Faculty of the University of Louvain (Belgium, 1959-1960). From 1963 to 1969 he was Research Director of the International Laboratory of Genetics and Biophysics in Naples, and he subsequently fulfilled the same responsibilities at the Laboratorio di Embriologia moleculare in Arc0 Felice near Naples, until 1981. As an Emeritus Professor, he continued to carry out research, full of good humor and dry wit, his active periods alternating with recreation at his “ Villa Les Oursins”, in Le Dramont, St. Raphael, France. Jean Brachet received numerous scientific honours, prizes, and awards, the most important of which are listed
below, and served - as a member, officer or president a total of 40 scientific societies and committees and as editor or coeditor - 11 journals, including - from 1973 on - this journal Differentiation. A full life, an admirable man. -
Honours awarded to Jean Brachet
Scientific prizes Laurtat du Concours Universitaire, 1933 LaurCat du Concours des Bourses de Voyage du Governement Belgique, 1934 Van Beneden Prize, 1936 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) De Potter Prize, 1943 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) Francqui Prize, 1948 (Francqui Foundation) Auguste Slosse Prize, 1950 (Academy of Medicine of Belgium) Albert Brachet Prize, 1953 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) Charles Meyer Prize, 1957 and 1969 (French Society of Biological Chemistry and Academy of Sciences of Paris) Schleiden-Medaille, 1961 (German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, Halle) H.P. Heineken Prize, 1967 (Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences) Quinquennial Prize of Fundamental Medical Sciences, 1971 (Royal Belgium Academy) L. Elections
to scientific academies
Danish Royal Academy, 1956 (Foreign Member) American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Boston), 1959 (Honorary Member) Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1960 (Honorary Fellow) Member of the Royal Academy of Belgium, 1960 Membre Correspondant de 1’Acadkmie Royale de Medecine, 1962 Member of the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, Halle, 1962 Istituto Lombardo, Accademia di Scienze e Lettere, Milan, 1964 (Foreign Member) National Academy of Sciences of the USA, Washington, 1965 (Foreign Member) Member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences, 1965 Royal Society of London, 1966 (Foreign Member) Membre Titulaire de 1’Acadkmie Royale de Medicine, 1968 Correspondent of the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna, 1971 Academy of Sciences of Paris, 1972 (Membre Correspondent) Foreign Associate of the Academy of Sciences of Paris, 1974 Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Roma, 1978 (Foreign Member)
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3. Offices and honorary memberships in scientific societies (list incomplete) -
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Belgian Society of Biochemistry (Vice-president, 1956-1960, President 1960-61) Belgian Society of Biology (Vice-president, 1956-1957) Society for Anti-Cancer Chemotherapy (Vice-president)
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French Society of Biology Edinburgh University Biological Society (Honorary President, 1950-1951) Cambridge Philosophical Society Society for Growth and Development (USA, Honorary Member) Histochemical Society (USA, Honorary Member) Japan Society of Cell Chemistry (Honorary Member) Zoological Society of india (Foreign Fellow) Italian Association of Cellular Biology and Differentiation American Society of Biochemical Chemists (Honorary Member, 1961) American Society of Zoologists (Honorary Member, 1985) Belgian Society of Cell Biology (President, 1971) German Society for Cell Biology (Honorary Member, 1976) Belgian Society of Cellular Biology (Honorary President) International Society of Differentiation (President and Honorary Life-President)
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Some autobiographical literature on scientific achievements of Jean Brachet: -
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4. Honorary doctorates -
University of Poitiers, 1954 Weizmann Institute of Rehovot, Israel, 1959
University of Torino, 1960 University of Palermo, 1962 University of Edinburgh, 1962 University of Strasbourg, 1964 Faculty of Agronomics of Gembloux, 1966 University of Lille, 1968 University of Liege, 1965
Interactions between Embryology and Molecular Biology (1983) Acta Embryo1 Morphol Exper n.s., 4 (3): 169-177 A few reminiscences about nucleocytoplasmic transport (1986) in: Peters R, Trendelenburg M (eds) Nucleocytoplasmic transport. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, pp. 1-9 Souvenirs sur les origines de la biologie moleculaire (1987) Bulletin de la Classe des Sciences de 1’Academie Royale de Belgique, 5‘ serie - Tome LXXIII, 1987-11, pp. 441-449 Reminiscences about nucleic acid cytochemistry and biochemistry (1987) Trends in Biochemical Sciences 12 (6), 244246 Werner W. Franke
Differentiation (1988) 39: 1-3
Ontogeny and Neoplasia 0 Springer-Verlag 2988
0bit uary
In memoriam: Jean Brachet 1909-1988
Jean Brachet, a man and a friend as we have known him and shall keep him in our memories, with his characteristic instruments microscope and the pipe.
- the
Jean Louis Auguste Brachet, Founder-President and Honorary Life President (from 1978) of the International Society of Differentiation, and long-term Editor of this journal, died on August 10th 1988, in the 80th year of his life, from cancer of the liver. Our sorrow can be overcome only by the admiration of his achievements, his personality, and the fulfilled life of a scientist. Jean Brachet was an outstanding scientist of this century, one of the fathers of modern cell and developmental biology, a “living legend” to many of us, who remained an active researcher until the end of his life. Born on March 19th 1909, in the small Belgian town of Etterbeek, Jean Brachet studied medicine at the Universi-
ty of Brussels (1927-1934). There, his interest in fundamental problems of cell biology first arose when he heard, in a lecture given by his professor of histology, Pol Gtrard, that enucleate portions of cytoplasm can survive and display several cellular functions for remarkable periods of time. Of similar importance to Jean Brachet’s career was the influence of his father Albert, a well-known embryology professor, and his collaborator, Albert Dalcq, who was certainly responsible for initiating Jean’s life-long preference for cytochemical methods and for suitably large cells with large nuclei, such as oocytes of various species, amoebas, and the giant unicellular green alga Acetabularia. Using the newly discovered “ Feulgen reaction”, in combination
2
with methyl green-pyronine staining and nuclease digestions, Jean Brachet discovered RNA (called “ zymonucleic” or even “phytonucleic” acid at that time) as a major constituent of animal cells. Moreover, he observed that, while chromatin is generally rich in DNA (“ thymonucleic acid”), RNA is specifically enriched in certain other nuclear structures, notably the nucleoli, and that some RNA moves from the nucleus to the cytoplasm and directs protein synthesis, an important conclusion simultaneously and independently also made by T.O. Caspersson in Stockholm (J. Brachet, Arch Biol 53:207, 1941; T.O. Caspersson, Z Naturwiss 29: 33, 1941). Other important and seminal discoveries of Jean Brachet include the occurrence of DNA in chloroplasts and its involvement in chloroplast-specific RNA synthesis independent of the nucleus, the first example of transport of a protein from the cytoplasm into the nucleus, and the correlation between rounds of nuclear divisions and preceding DNA synthesis, observed in early cleavage stages of embryogenesis. In addition to leading a fruitful life as a researcher, he was also a prime motivator in the introduction of cytochemistry and the integration of morphological and biochemical approaches in cell biology. This is particularly evident from his major textbooks, which represent milestones in the progress of cell and developmental biology : Embryologie Chimique (1944), Chemical Embryology (1950), Biochemical Cytology (1957), The Biochemistry of Development (1960), The Cell (1964, six volumes, with A.E. Mirsky), Introduction to Molecular Biology (1974), and Molecular Cytology (1985). After receiving his doctoral (M.D.) degree in 1934, Jean Brachet remained as an Assistant at the University of Brussels until 1938. During this period he also worked, as a scientific visitor, in a number of other places, specifically the famous marine research laboratories of France (Roscoff and Slte), Italy (Naples), and the USA (Woods Hole). In 1937, he also visited Princeton University, as a Travelling Fellow of the Rockefeller Foundation. The following year, he was promoted to the position of “Charge de Cours” at the Science Faculty of the University of Brussels, where he became a Full Professor in 1942, a position which he retained - together with the Directorship of the Laboratory of Animal Morphology of the Universite Libre de Bruxelles in Rhode St. Genlse until 1977, when he retired from his professorial duties, although not from experimental biology. In the years after the Second World War he also lectured and studied as a guest at various other institutions, such as the Pasteur Institute (Paris, 1946), the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, 1947), the Marine Biological Laboratory (Woods Hole, USA, 1947), the Medical Faculty of the University of Liege (Belgium, 1948-1949), the Rockefeller Institute (now Rockefeller University; New York, 1958), and at the Medical Faculty of the University of Louvain (Belgium, 1959-1960). From 1963 to 1969 he was Research Director of the International Laboratory of Genetics and Biophysics in Naples, and he subsequently fulfilled the same responsibilities at the Laboratorio di Embriologia moleculare in Arc0 Felice near Naples, until 1981. As an Emeritus Professor, he continued to carry out research, full of good humor and dry wit, his active periods alternating with recreation at his “ Villa Les Oursins”, in Le Dramont, St. Raphael, France. Jean Brachet received numerous scientific honours, prizes, and awards, the most important of which are listed
below, and served - as a member, officer or president a total of 40 scientific societies and committees and as editor or coeditor - 11 journals, including - from 1973 on - this journal Differentiation. A full life, an admirable man. -
Honours awarded to Jean Brachet
Scientific prizes Laurtat du Concours Universitaire, 1933 LaurCat du Concours des Bourses de Voyage du Governement Belgique, 1934 Van Beneden Prize, 1936 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) De Potter Prize, 1943 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) Francqui Prize, 1948 (Francqui Foundation) Auguste Slosse Prize, 1950 (Academy of Medicine of Belgium) Albert Brachet Prize, 1953 (Academy of Sciences of Belgium) Charles Meyer Prize, 1957 and 1969 (French Society of Biological Chemistry and Academy of Sciences of Paris) Schleiden-Medaille, 1961 (German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, Halle) H.P. Heineken Prize, 1967 (Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences) Quinquennial Prize of Fundamental Medical Sciences, 1971 (Royal Belgium Academy) L. Elections
to scientific academies
Danish Royal Academy, 1956 (Foreign Member) American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Boston), 1959 (Honorary Member) Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1960 (Honorary Fellow) Member of the Royal Academy of Belgium, 1960 Membre Correspondant de 1’Acadkmie Royale de Medecine, 1962 Member of the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, Halle, 1962 Istituto Lombardo, Accademia di Scienze e Lettere, Milan, 1964 (Foreign Member) National Academy of Sciences of the USA, Washington, 1965 (Foreign Member) Member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences, 1965 Royal Society of London, 1966 (Foreign Member) Membre Titulaire de 1’Acadkmie Royale de Medicine, 1968 Correspondent of the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna, 1971 Academy of Sciences of Paris, 1972 (Membre Correspondent) Foreign Associate of the Academy of Sciences of Paris, 1974 Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Roma, 1978 (Foreign Member)
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3. Offices and honorary memberships in scientific societies (list incomplete) -
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Belgian Society of Biochemistry (Vice-president, 1956-1960, President 1960-61) Belgian Society of Biology (Vice-president, 1956-1957) Society for Anti-Cancer Chemotherapy (Vice-president)
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French Society of Biology Edinburgh University Biological Society (Honorary President, 1950-1951) Cambridge Philosophical Society Society for Growth and Development (USA, Honorary Member) Histochemical Society (USA, Honorary Member) Japan Society of Cell Chemistry (Honorary Member) Zoological Society of india (Foreign Fellow) Italian Association of Cellular Biology and Differentiation American Society of Biochemical Chemists (Honorary Member, 1961) American Society of Zoologists (Honorary Member, 1985) Belgian Society of Cell Biology (President, 1971) German Society for Cell Biology (Honorary Member, 1976) Belgian Society of Cellular Biology (Honorary President) International Society of Differentiation (President and Honorary Life-President)
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Some autobiographical literature on scientific achievements of Jean Brachet: -
-
-
~
4. Honorary doctorates -
University of Poitiers, 1954 Weizmann Institute of Rehovot, Israel, 1959
University of Torino, 1960 University of Palermo, 1962 University of Edinburgh, 1962 University of Strasbourg, 1964 Faculty of Agronomics of Gembloux, 1966 University of Lille, 1968 University of Liege, 1965
Interactions between Embryology and Molecular Biology (1983) Acta Embryo1 Morphol Exper n.s., 4 (3): 169-177 A few reminiscences about nucleocytoplasmic transport (1986) in: Peters R, Trendelenburg M (eds) Nucleocytoplasmic transport. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, pp. 1-9 Souvenirs sur les origines de la biologie moleculaire (1987) Bulletin de la Classe des Sciences de 1’Academie Royale de Belgique, 5‘ serie - Tome LXXIII, 1987-11, pp. 441-449 Reminiscences about nucleic acid cytochemistry and biochemistry (1987) Trends in Biochemical Sciences 12 (6), 244246 Werner W. Franke