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Science and Nature publish the most fashionable papers

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Where papers on H2 were published
Jan Klein Scientist
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Before I leave this part of my narration, I would like to make one point that seemed to be... seems to me to be important. Eventually it turned out that the H2 molecule... the MHC was one of three most essential molecules in immunology, the others being immunoglobulins and the T cell receptor. The T cell receptor at that time was still a very open question. There were claims that it is an immunoglobulin, another kind of contributing factors in the whole confusion because papers were published where it was demonstrated it was an immunoglobulin. Obviously all wrong, not true.

So there was still one player left out, but MHC was now clearly in and was very important. It would seem that such an important molecule... that the research on such an important molecule would open... would be publishable in the best journals, let's say Nature, Science, Proceedings, National Academy later Cell and so on. Well, it's interesting to see where the papers on H2 were published. So, let's take Gorer. Gorer published his papers, and I think Gorer... well, Snell got a Nobel Prize eventually, Gorer unfortunately died, but if he lived, I think he would have been a Nobel Prize winner as well. So where did Gorer publish the H2 works? It was in Journal of GeneticsBritish Journal of Experimental PathologyJournal of Pathology and Bacteriology, Journal of... that's the same one, Cancer ResearchBritish Journal of Cancer, and so on.

Born in 1936, Jan Klein is a Czech-American immunologist who co-founded the modern science of immunogenetics – key to understanding illness and disease. He is the author or co-author of over 560 scientific publications and of seven books including 'Where Do We Come From?' which examines the molecular evolution of humans. He graduated from the Charles University at Prague in 1955, and received his MS in Botany from the same school in 1958. From 1977 to his retirement in 2004, he was the Director of the Max Planck Institute for Biology at Tübingen, Germany.

Listeners: Colm O'hUigin

Colm O'hUigin is a senior staff scientist at the US National Cancer Institute. He received his BA, MSc and PhD at the Genetics Department of Trinity College, Dublin where he later returned as a lecturer. He has held appointments at the Center for Population and Demographic Genetics, UT Houston, and at the University of Cambridge. As an EMBO fellow, he moved in 1990 to the Max Planck Institute for Biology in Tübingen, Germany to work with Jan Klein and lead a research group studying the evolutionary origins of immune molecules, of teeth, trypanosomes and of species.

Tags: MHC, T cell receptor, immunoglobulin, Nobel prize, Journal of Genetics, British Journal of Experimental Pathology, Journal of Pathology and Bacteriology, Cancer Research, British Journal of Cancer, George Davis Snell, Peter Alfred Gorer

Duration: 2 minutes, 33 seconds

Date story recorded: August 2005

Date story went live: 24 January 2008