Herbert W. Boyer Interview: Reference Chronology
Compiled by Nancy Rockafellar, Ph.D., Editor

• 1960s: Education & Training
• 1970s: Decade of Discovery & Controversy
• 1980s: Commercialization of Recombinant Research

1960s: Education & Training
1963: Herbert Boyer completes a Ph.D. in Microbiology at the University of Pittsburgh

1963-1966: Postdoctoral work at Yale University with Ed Adelberg

1966: Herbert Boyer accepts a position as assistant professor in the UCSF Department of Microbiology; begins work on restriction and modification of DNA

1969: Screening UCSF Plasmids for genes that restrict and modify DNA; EcoR1 endonuclease makes specific cleavages in DNA and creates cohesive (sticky) ends; collaboration between Boyer and Goodman Labs.

1970s: Decade of Discovery & Controversy
November 1972: Hawaii Conference: Stanley Cohen reports on ability to clone plasmid DNA; Herbert Boyer describes actions of restriction endonuclease EcoR1
Waikiki Beach Deli: A late night meeting marks the beginning of the Cohen-Boyer collaboration

1972-73: Herbert Boyer encounters electrophoresed agarose gels using the fluorescent ethidium bromide stain; learns the technique from colleagues at Cold Spring Harbor

22-24 January 1973: Asolimar I conference on the biohazards in biological research

March 1973: Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen achieve the first successful DNA splicing

June 1973: Gordon Research Conference on Nucleic Acids, New Hampton, NH

September 1973: Publication in Science of the Singer-Soll letter notes dangers of rDNA gene splicing

November 1973: Publication of paper on DNA splicing: Stanley N. Cohen, Annie C. Y. Chang, Herbert W. Boyer, and Robert B. Helling, Construction of Biologically Functional Bacterial Plasmids In Vitro, PNAS 70 (Nov. 1973)

May 1974: Paper on the transfer of animal DNA fragment into E coli plasmid: John R. Morrow, Stanley H. Cohen, Annie C. Y. Chang, Herbert W. Boyer, Howard M. Goodman, and Robert B. Helling, Replication and Transcript of Eukaryotic DNA in Escherichia coli, PNAS 71 (May 1974)

26 July 1974: Berg Letter published in Science calls for guidelines for recombinant DNA research; signed by eleven noted scientists, including Herbert Boyer

1974: Informal moratorium on recombinant DNA research

7 October 1974: The National Institutes of Health (NIH) establishes the Recombinant DNA Molecule Program Advisory Committee (RAC)

4 November 1974: Patent application filed by Stanford University, instigated by Neils Reimers, "Process for Producing Biologically Functional Molecular Chimeras"

February 1975: Asilomar II Conference

28 February 1975: First meeting of the NIH Recombinant DNA Molecule Program Advisory Committee (RAC)

7 April 1976: Robert Swanson and Herbert Boyer found Genentech

23 June 1976: NIH Guidelines released

July 1976: NIH Guidelines published in the Federal Register 41 (131); abstracted in Nature (1 July 1976)

Autumn 1976: Biosafety Committee formed at UCSF; Microbiologist Dr. David Martin is the first chairman

January to March 1977: pBR322 Incident at UCSF

May 1977: UCSF Group: Rutter-Goodman lab clone the rat insulin gene

September 1977: Nicholas Wade Article in Science reveals problems in interpreting and enforcing NIH guidelines

2 November 1977: Herbert Boyer and William J. Rutter testify before the Stevenson Subcommittee on Science, Technology and Space, Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, US Senate

1 December 1977: Genentech press conference announces synthesis of Somatostatin

9 December 1997: Publication of Somatostatin paper:
K. Itakura, R. Crea., T. Hirose, A. D. Riggs, H. L. Heyneker, F. Boliver, and H. W. Boyer, Expression in Escherichia coli of a Chemically Synthesized Gene for the Hormone Somatostatin, Science 198 (9 December 1977)

May 1978: W. Gilbert's Harvard Lab announces expression of the insulin gene in bacteria

6 September 1978: City of Hope/Genentech press conference on the insulin gene; Genentech gains credibility and creates a direct approach to synthesis of human insulin

1979: Genentech scientists clone human growth hormone. The UCSF Academic Senate ponders new precedents in university-industry relations, primarily concerned with the impact of Genentech upon university laboratory research

1980s: Commercialization of Recombinant Research
Q Fever scare at UCSF demonstrates the fallibility of biohazards guidelines

14 October 1980: Genentech goes public and raises $35 million with its first stock offering (a record stock run-up)

16 June 1980: US Supreme Court rules that living manmade organisms are patentable subject matter

2 December 1980: Process patent issued

August 1981: Licensing begins

1982: First recombinant DNA drug marketed: human insulin, licensed to Eli Lilly & Co.

August 1984: Product patent for prokaryote DNA issued

26 April 1988: Eukaryotic patent issued

1990s
Fiscal year 94/95: The three Cohen-Boyer patents generated $27 million in royalty revenue.