Overview

This book is an account of the first great triumph of genomics: the thirty-year struggle to decode the complete DNA of a nematode worm. Success in this was what made the human genome project possible. IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORM is an exciting but scrupulous account of a genuine scientific triumph, which will delight both those who know the subject and those who don't. IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORM tells of some remarkable characters who have changed our approach to science irrevocably, among them Sydney Brenner, a heroic dreamer who first thought of understanding an animal as a sort of biological Meccano; John Sulston, his first post-doctoral student, who managed to raise GBP30 million; his friend, Bob Horvitz, who has, to all intents and purposes, spent more than thirty years studying the 22 cells of a worm's vulva; and Fred Sanger, the only man to have won two Nobel Prizes in the same discipline. Decades of painstaking research triumphed in 1998, when this worm was the first creature to have all its DNA mapped -- but now what? We still don't know how to build a single worm. In this intriguing story of dreams and disillusionment, Andrew Brown contemplates the next fifty years of biological science, and the way that ignorance expands to surround all available knowledge.

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9780743415989

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Reviews

As author of the Darwin Wars, Andrew Brown has dealt with some big topics in his time. Now he has chosen to tackle one of the smallest. To the uninitiated, the half a millimetre long, transparent, hermaphrodite nematode worm - Caenorhabditis Elegans - might not seem important enough to merit an entire book. Yet this creature has played a key role in the history of modern molecular biology. Learning about it has given us an insight into the workings of other, more complex life-forms, including our own, and the nematode was the first multi-cellular creature to be gene sequenced. Encompassing over 30 years of scientific experimentation and discussion, the book looks at the problems, personalities and painstaking work involved in the laborious study of this tiny organism. From Sydney Brenner, pun-loving child prodigy, to John Sulston, bearded, bohemian visionary, the characters involved in this story are almost as remarkable as the tale itself. This is a story of hard-working dreamers whose passion and dedication for one tiny creature has resulted in what Tony Blair called 'the first great technological triumph of the twenty-first century'. For, without the work on the nematode worm, there would have been no human genome project. In this, the 50th anniversary of the discovery of the double-helix, it therefore seems appropriate to pay tribute to those scientists who have devoted their lives to this tiny creature, and ask: where do we go from here? After all, as Brown reminds us, decoding and mapping DNA is just the beginning, What we may now be able to do - or want to do - with this new knowledge is a question still to be resolved. A thoughtful and inspirational read. (Kirkus UK)

Author Information

Andrew Brown is a freelance journalist who writes extensively for the SUNDAY TIMES, the INDEPENDENT and the DAILY MAIL. In 1995 he won the Templeton Prize as the best religious affairs correspondent in Europe. As well as THE DARWIN WARS he is the author of a highly acclaimed book on the London police called WATCHING THE DETECTIVES.

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