Frederick M Ausubel (born September 2, 1945) is an American molecular biologist and professor of genetics at

Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is consi ...

in Boston and is the Karl Winnacker Distinguished Investigator in the Department of Molecular Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston.,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

Education

Ausubel obtained his undergraduate degree in 1966 at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...

Urbana, Illinois Urbana ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Champaign County, Illinois, United States. As of the 2020 census, Urbana had a population of 38,336. As of the 2010 United States Census, Urbana is the List of municipalities in Illinois, 38th-most pop ...

. He received his Ph.D. in Biology in 1972 from

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

Research

Ausubel's scientific work concerns host-microbe interactions. In the 1970s and 1980s, his laboratory worked on the molecular basis of symbiotic

nitrogen fixation Nitrogen fixation is a chemical process by which molecular nitrogen (), with a strong triple covalent bond, in the air is converted into ammonia () or related nitrogenous compounds, typically in soil or aquatic systems but also in industry. Atmo ...

, the process by which legumes, in concert with a bacterial symbiont, convert atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia. One of his post-docs during this time was

Sharon R. Long Sharon Rugel Long (born March 2, 1951) is an American plant biologist. She is the Steere-Pfizer Professor of Biological Science in the Department of Biology at Stanford University, and the Principal Investigator of the Long Laboratory at Stanford. ...

. Over the last 20 years, Ausubel's lab has worked on the development of so-called multi-host pathogenesis systems that involve the infection of hosts, including the well-studied nematode ''

Caenorhabditis elegans ''Caenorhabditis elegans'' () is a free-living transparent nematode about 1 mm in length that lives in temperate soil environments. It is the type species of its genus. The name is a blend of the Greek ''caeno-'' (recent), ''rhabditis'' (ro ...

'' and the reference plant ''

Arabidopsis thaliana ''Arabidopsis thaliana'', the thale cress, mouse-ear cress or arabidopsis, is a small flowering plant native to Eurasia and Africa. ''A. thaliana'' is considered a weed; it is found along the shoulders of roads and in disturbed land. A winter a ...

,'' with a variety of

bacterial Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were among ...

and fungal pathogens. His research helped elucidate the innate immune signaling pathways in these two model hosts and determined which aspects of the innate immune response are conserved and whether they were derived by a process of divergent or convergent evolution. His laboratory currently uses the ''C. elegans'' pathogenesis model to study intestinal epithelial immunity and how hosts distinguish pathogens from beneficial commensal microorganisms. Related work in his laboratory concerns the identification and characterization of low molecular weight compounds that specifically activate ''C. elegans'' immune signaling pathways. His laboratory assembled an automated ''C. elegans'' sample preparation pipeline to enable high-throughput chemical screens using whole animals based on automated image analysis. As of 2013, Ausubel had published 215 refereed scientific articles. In addition to serving on a variety of

editorial board The editorial board is a group of experts, usually at a publication, who dictate the tone and direction the publication's editorial policy will take. Mass media At a newspaper, the editorial board usually consists of the editorial page editor, a ...

s, Ausubel is founding editor of '' Current Protocols in Molecular Biology''.

Awards and honors

Ausubel was elected as a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

in 1994, the

American Academy of Microbiology The American Society for Microbiology (ASM), originally the Society of American Bacteriologists, is a professional organization for scientists who study viruses, bacteria, fungi, algae, and protozoa as well as other aspects of microbiology. It wa ...

in 2002 and also the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

in 2003. Ausubel received the 2014,

Thomas Hunt Morgan Medal The Thomas Hunt Morgan Medal is awarded by the Genetics Society of America (GSA) for lifetime contributions to the field of genetics. The medal is named after Thomas Hunt Morgan, the 1933 Nobel Prize winner, who received this award for his work wi ...

, for lifetime achievement in the field of genetics. Ausubel has been recognized as a Pioneer Member of the

American Society of Plant Biologists American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

References

External links

* http://ausubellab.mgh.harvard.edu/ * http://chemicalbiology.mgh.harvard.edu/labs-ausubel.htm * http://molbio.mgh.harvard.edu/laboratories/ausubel * https://web.archive.org/web/20160304115806/https://www.landesbioscience.com/article/26579/full_text/#load/info/all {{DEFAULTSORT:Ausubel, Frederick American molecular biologists Living people 1945 births Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni