Sturtevant, Alfred Henry

Sturtevant, Alfred Henry 

Born Nov. 21, 1891, in Jacksonville, 111.; died Apr. 6, 1970, in Pasadena, Calif. American geneticist. Member of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA.

Sturtevant graduated from Columbia University in 1912. He was a professor at the California Institute of Technology from 1928 to 1962. From 1911 he worked in T. H. Morgan’s laboratory, where he made an important contribution to the development of the chromosome theory of heredity. In 1913, he was the first to substantiate the theory of the linear arrangement of genes in chromosomes, suggesting that genes be mapped according to their frequency of crossing-over. Sturtevant discovered the phenomenon of suppression in 1920 and the gene position effect in 1925. In 1926 he determined that chromosomal parts are subject to inversion and studied the effect of chromosomal parts on crossing-over. Sturtevant’s works dealt with the systematics and comparative cytogenetics of various species of the genus Drosophila.

WORKS

The Mechanism of Mendelian Heredity, 2nd ed. New York, 1923. (T. H. Morgan and others.)
The Genetics of Drosophila. The Hague, 1925. (With T. H. Morgan and C. B. Bridges.)
An Introduction to Genetics. Philadelphia-London, 1939. (With G. W. Beadle.)
Genetics and Evolution: Selected Papers. San Francisco, 1961.
A History of Genetics. New York, 1965.

A. E. GAISINOVICH