Denis Oswald Jordan AO

FAA The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...

FRACI (23 September 1914,

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

– 12 February 1982, St Georges, South Australia) was an Anglo-Australian chemist with a distinguished career as a researcher and lecturer in Chemistry at both

University College Nottingham , mottoeng = A city is built on wisdom , established = 1798 – teacher training college1881 – University College Nottingham1948 – university status , type = Public , chancellor ...

(1940–53) and the

University of Adelaide The University of Adelaide (informally Adelaide University) is a public research university located in Adelaide, South Australia. Established in 1874, it is the third-oldest university in Australia. The university's main campus is located on N ...

, where he was Angas Professor of Chemistry from 1958 to 1982. Jordan also served as president of Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering from 1958 to 1962, and

Royal Australian Chemical Institute The Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI) is both the qualifying body in Australia for professional chemists and a learned society promoting the science and practice of chemistry in all its branches. The RACI hosts conferences, seminars and ...

from 1978 to 1979. First published in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 17, (MUP), 2007. Whilst at Nottingham 'Doj' Jordan was a key member of the team whose research made important contributions to the eventual decoding of DNA in 1953. Jordan worked with

John Masson Gulland John Masson Gulland (14 October 1898 – 26 October 1947) was a Scottish chemist and biochemist. His main work was on nucleic acids, morphine and aporphine alkaloids. His work at University College Nottingham on electrometric titration was im ...

, Michael Creeth and others on a series of experiments in 1947 which firstly created high quality DNA, then measured its viscocity, and finally demonstrated the hydrogen bonds within the molecule. Their discoveries were ultimately acknowledged by James Watson as critical contributions even if he did at first dismiss them incorrectly: "...a rereading of J. M. Gulland's and D. O. Jordan's papers...made me finally realize the strength of their conclusion that a large fraction, if not all, of the bases formed hydrogen bonds to other bases." Gulland and Jordan's work was also acknowledged in the first papers concerning the decoding of DNA by Rosalind Franklin and

Raymond Gosling Raymond George Gosling (15 July 1926 – 18 May 2015) was a British scientist. While a PhD student at King's College, London he worked under the supervision of Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin. The crystallographic experiments of Frankli ...

. It has however been argued that the work of the Nottingham team was subsequently overlooked until commemorations were held in 2010 and 2017. Jordan continued to work at Nottingham University on deoxyribonucleic acid after the untimely death of Gulland in the

Goswick rail crash The Goswick rail crash occurred on 26 October 1947 near the village of Goswick, Northumberland, England. The '' Flying Scotsman'' express from Edinburgh Waverley to London King's Cross failed to slow down for a diversion and derailed. Twenty- ...

in October 1947, but in 1953 he was appointed to a professorship in Adelaide where he arrived in 1954. In 1981, the

, named its physical and inorganic Chemistry building after Jordan. In November 2017 a plaque was unveiled in the Trent Building at University of Nottingham commemorating the 70th anniversary of the "Discovery of Hydrogen Bonds in DNA by JM Creeth, DO Jordan and JM Gulland".

Publications

*''The Chemistry of Nucleic Acids'' (1960)

Awards

Jordan was awarded a number of honours, including: *1954 - Fellow of the

(FRACI) *1963 - Liversidge Research Lecture, Royal Society of New South Wales *1970 -

Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science The Fellowship of the Australian Academy of Science is made up of about 500 Australian scientists. Scientists judged by their peers to have made an exceptional contribution to knowledge in their field may be elected to Fellowship of the Academy ...

*1974 - Medal, Polymer Division, RACI (Now named Batteard-Jordan Australian Polymer Medal) *1980 - Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) *1981 - Leighton Memorial Medal

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jordan, Denis Oswald 1914 births 1982 deaths Australian chemists Fellows of the Australian Academy of Science History of genetics Officers of the Order of Australia Academic staff of the University of Adelaide