Robert Olby

Robert Cecil Olby (born October 4, 1933 in Beckenham , Kent ) is a professor at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh .

Robert Olby is known as a former lecturer at the University of Leeds in England, as a connoisseur of the history of biology in the 19th and 20th centuries. His specialties are genetics and molecular biology . He has contributed to the 50th anniversary of the deciphering of the structure of DNA and is also a sought-after participant in popular science publications. His biography of Francis Crick , who with support from the National Science Foundation of the Archives and a Fellowship Churchill College of Cambridge University was written, was due to protests Crick's only after his death by the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory published Press. The work on this biography was one of the high points in Olby's academic career, as he had numerous interviews with leading academics such as John Desmond Bernal , Sydney Brenner , Francis Crick, Aaron Klug , Max Perutz , James D. Watson and Maurice for the writing of the work Wilkins led. His most important contribution to the history of biology in the 20th century is the book The Path to the Double Helix: The Discovery of DNA , which was first published in 1974 and expanded by the author in a second edition in 1994. The comprehensive work "The History of the University of Cambridge" makes direct reference to Olby's contributions.

Publications by Robert Olby

• Charles Darwin . Oxford University Press, London 1967, 64pp.
• Early Nineteenth Century European Scientists ; Pergamon Press, 1967, 179pp. ISBN 0-415-14578-3
• The Origins of Mendelism . Constable 1966. 204 pages, ISBN 0-226-62592-3
• The Twentieth Century Sciences, Studies in the Biography of Ideas. edited by Gerald Holton; WW Norton & Co., New York 1972: article "Francis Crick, DNA, and the Central Dogma".
• Rosalind Elsie Franklin biography in "Dictionary of Scientific Biography", ed. Charles C. Gillespie (New York: Charles Scribner's sons) ISBN 0-684-10121-1
• The Path to the Double Helix: The Discovery of DNA . University of Washington Press, (Seattle 1974 & revised 1994) ISBN 0-486-68117-3
• Companion to the History of Modern Science (ed.); Routledge, London 1990, 1081pp. ISBN 0-415-01988-5
• Robert Darlington : Forgotten Prophet of Genetics . American Scientist Nov-Dec 2004
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Huxley, Sir Julian Sorell (1887–1975). first published Sept 2004, 2680 words
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Bernal, (John) Desmond (1901–1971). first published Sept 2004, 2870 words, with portrait illustration
• Francis Crick : Hunter of Life's Secrets. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, ISBN 978-0-87969-798-3 , published August 25, 2009; 450 pp; [1] (PDF file; 59 kB) and Peter Lawrence's review in "Current Biology" [2] .
• Crick, Francis Harry Compton (1916-2004) . Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online edn , Oxford University Press, Jan 2008 *
• Max Ferdinand Perutz (1914-2002) . Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online edn , Oxford University Press, Jan 2008 *
• Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins (1916-2004) . Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online edn , Oxford University Press, Jan 2008 *

Individual evidence

1. ^ Quiet debut for the double helix
2. ^ "Self-Made Things" - a BBC radio broadcast on genetics.

Web links

• Homepage of Robert Olby
• His Australian lecture, March 2010
• Late night live interview
• Robert C. Olby Collection
• Quotes on Linus Pauling and The Race for DNA from the Oregon State University web site.
• Article on Consciousness Independent On Line, June 7, 2006.
• For Fleur Olby's web site.
• For Martin Packer's web site: Remembering Francis Crick.
• Correspondence between Crick and Robert Olby regarding draft chapters of Olby (1974) The Path to the Double Helix: the Discovery of DNA, and Crick's detailed comments on portions of Olby's draft text.