2002 Dickson Prize in Medicine
C. David Allis, PhD
Joy and Jack Fishman Professor
Head, Laboratory of Chromatin Biology and Epigenetics
Rockefeller University
Bio
The focus of research in the laboratory of C. David Allis, PhD, is deciphering and translating the “histone code.” Histone proteins form nucleosomal complexes that make up eukaryotic chromatin, which manages the genetic information in each cell and facilitates access to specific genes. The way DNA is packaged within chromatin determines how the DNA functions in terms of transcription, replication, and chromosome segregation. At the most fundamental level, these functions are controlled by histones. Allis’s laboratory favors the view that histone proteins are major carriers of epigenetic information.
Allis’s research deals with how chemical changes to histone proteins affect gene expression. Through enzymatic processes such as histone acetylation or histone methylation, for example, histones are believed to function like a master on/off switch and determine whether particular genes are active or inactive. Knowing how to control which genes to turn on or off could reduce the risk of certain diseases, such as by activating genes that suppress tumor growth and deactivating genes that support it.
Allis did graduate studies (MS and PhD in biology) at Indiana University and postdoctoral work at the University of Rochester before he began his research career at Baylor College of Medicine. When he won the Dickson Prize in Medicine, he was the Harry F. Byrd Jr. Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics, professor of microbiology, and a member of the Center for Cell Signaling at the University of Virginia Health System in Charlottesville. (Since then, Allis has moved to Rockefeller University, where he is the Joy and Jack Fishman Professor and head of the Laboratory of Chromatin Biology and Epigenetics.)
His honors include the 2000 Hamner Distinguished Lecturer Award for Molecular Cell Biology at Virginia Tech, election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2001, and the 2001 Baxter Award for Distinguished Research in the Biomedical Sciences from the Association of American Medical Colleges. (After winning the Dickson Prize, Allis also was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and received the 2003 Massry Prize from the Meira and Shaul G. Massry Foundation, the 2004 Wiley Prize in Biomedical Sciences, and the 2007 Gairdner Foundation International Award.)
Dickson Prize in Medicine Winners
2020
2010
2000
2000 Elizabeth H. Blackburn, PhD
1999 James E. Darnell Jr., MD
1998 Richard D. Klausner, MD
1997 Edward E. Harlow Jr., PhD,
and Eric S. Lander, PhD
1996 Philippa Marrack, PhD
1995 Ronald M. Evans, PhD
1994 Bert Vogelstein, MD
1993 Stanley B. Prusiner, MD
1992 Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD
1991 Phillip A. Sharp, PhD
1990
1990 Ernst Knobil, PhD
1989 Bernard Moss, MD, PhD
1988 Leroy E. Hood, MD, PhD
1987 Elvin A. Kabat, PhD
1986 J. Michael Bishop, MD
1985 Robert C. Gallo, MD
1984 Solomon H. Snyder, MD
1983 Eric R. Kandel, MD
1982 Francis H. Ruddle, PhD
1981 Philip Leder, MD
1980
1980 David H. Hubel, MD,
and Torsten N. Wiesel, MD
1979 Bert W. O’Malley, MD
1978 Paul Greengard, PhD
1977 Roger Guillemin, MD, PhD
1976 Frank J. Dixon, MD
1975 Elizabeth F. Neufeld, PhD
1974 Stephen W. Kuffler, MD
1973 John H. Gibbon Jr., MD
1972 Solomon A. Berson, MD,
and Rosalyn S. Yalow, PhD
1971 Earl W. Sutherland Jr., MD