Present at the Flood: How Structural Molecular Biology Came About
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This book chronicles a revolution in molecular biology the crucial 30 years (roughly between 1933 and 1963) during which our ideas about proteins and nucleic acids changed from those of formless, functionless organic chemicals into precisely structured molecular machines with specific biological purpose. Proteins evolved from being colloidal micelles or globules with no specific structure (or even sequence) into quite precisely structured molecular catalysts, carrier proteins, and information-sensing agents. Indeed, the very idea that the amino acids of a protein were linked in a specific order in long linear chains was not accepted initially. During this same time period, DNA changed from being a sterile repeating polymer of no particular function (the tetranucleotide hypothesis) into a double helix that serves as the archive of genetic information. Without this revolution, molecular biology would not exist today, and biochemistry itself would still be a collection of recipes and unco
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