Historical Highlights is a new series of commentaries that summarize the critical insights of landmark articles in immunology and microbiology. They are intended especially for graduate and professional students and post-graduate trainees to deepen their understanding of foundational concepts.

Historical Highlight: The Luria-Delbrück Fluctuation Test – A Study of the Nature of Bacterial Mutations Conferring Resistance to Infection by Bacteriophage

In 1943, Salvador Luria, then at Indiana University, and Max Delbrück, then at Vanderbilt, published an analysis of mutations in Escherichia coli conferring resistance to infection by bacterial viruses, also referred to as bacteriophages [1]. Of note, Luria and Delbrück advanced our understanding of mutation prior to the publication by Oswald Avery, Colin MacLeod, and Maclyn McCarty in 1944, demonstrating that the so-called transforming principle, which was able to dramatically alter the surface and functional phenotypes of pneumococci, was composed of DNA [2]. The Avery et al paper is the focus of the initial Historical Highlight [3].

Published: October 17, 2024 | 10.20411/pai.v10i1.763

Historical Highlight: The Chemical Characterization of the Pneumococcal Transforming Principle

The editors of Pathogens and Immunity are commemorating this month, the 80th anniversary of the publication of the landmark article by Oswald Avery, Colin MacLeod, and Maclyn McCarty in the Journal of Experimental Medicine on February 1, 1944 [1]. The study by Avery et al determined with extraordinary rigor the chemical nature of the so-called transforming principle inferred to exist by Frederick Griffith based on experiments he published in 1928.

Published: February 28, 2024 | 10.20411/pai.v8i2.687