iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

1/ Albert Claude was born in Longlier, Belgium, 24 August 1898. A physician and cell biologist, in 1930 he developed the process of cell fractionation to identify and purify the RNA from the Rous sarcoma virus which causes cancer in chickens.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

1/ Roger Sperry was born in Hartford CT, USA, 20 Aug 1913. A neuropsychologist and neurobiologst, Sperry is best known for having shown that the two hemispheres of the brain function independently of one another and have completely different functions, a phenomenon he called the 'split brain'.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

1/ Salvador E Luria was born in Torino, Italy, 13 August 1912. Luria was a microbiologist who made his name in 1943 when he demonstrated, with Max Delbruck, that viruses undergo permanent changes in their hereditary material

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

1/ Frederick Sanger, twice Nobel Prize winner, was born 13 August 1918 in Rendcomb, UK. The first to determine the DNA sequence of insulin, Sanger proved proteins have a defined chemical composition.

111

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

1/ Reinhold Benesch was born in Poland, 13 August 1919. Benesch was a biochemist. He is best known for the discovery he made with his wife, Ruth Benesch in 1967 which showed how haemoglobin transports oxygen during respiration.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

1/ Arne W K Tiselius was born in Stockholm, Sweden, 10 Aug 1902. A Swedish biochemist, Tiselius devised electrophoresis, a technique used to separate charged macromolecules like DNA, RNA and proteins according to their size.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

1/ Cesar Milstein and Georges Kohler published their technique for monoclonal antibodies on 7 August 1975. Able to provide limitless quantities of antibodies for the first time, their technique was a major breakthrough.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

1/ Alexander Fleming was born 6 August 1881. A biologist and microbiologist, Fleming first made his mark in 1923 when he discovered lysosyme, an enzyme produced in the tears, saliva, mucus and human milk which is an important part of the immune system.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

1/ Jonathan Hutchinson was born in Selby, Yorkshire, UK, 23 July 1828. A physician and pathologist, Hutchinson is renowned for his life-long study of congenital syphilis.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

1/ Albert Calmette was born in Nice, France, 12 July 1863. Calmette was a physician and bacteriologist who is credited with the discovery that the virulence of bovine tubercle bacilli is weakened when cultured on bile-containing medium.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

How do you feel about the use of AI in medical imaging? The Department of Radiology at the University of Cambridge has launched a survey to understand what the public and patients know and think about the idea. Please complete and share the survey 'whatisbiotechnology.org/index.php/i…'

000

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

1/ Ludwig Guttmann was born in Tost, Prussia, German Empire (now Toszek, Poland) on 3 July 1899. A neurologist Guttmann organised the first Stoke Mandeville Games for disabled war veterans.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

1/ OTD, 30 July 1952, the first successful open heart surgery was performed. The surgery was performed on Henry Opticek, a 41-year-old male suffering from shortness of breath, by Forest D Dodrill at Harper University Hospital at Wayne State University in Michigan.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

1/ William H Stein was born in New York 25 June 1911. A biochemist, Stein shared the 1972 #NobelPrize for desciphering the composition and function of ribonuclease, an enzyme that catalyses the break down of RNA into smaller components.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

1/ Oliver Smithies was born in Halifax, UK, 23 June 1925. A geneticist and physical biochemist, Smithies first made his mark in 1955 through his invention of starch gel electrophoresis, a technique used to study human protein variation.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

1/ Ada E Yonath was born in Jerusalem, Palestine (now Israel), 22 June 1939. Yonath is a biochemist who won the #Nobelrize for Chemistry in 2009 for helping to map the structure of ribosomes, the molecule that helps translate RNA into protein.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

1/ Cyril N Hinshelwood was born in London, UK, 19 June 1897. Hinshelwood was a physical chemist who shared the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1956 for helping to work out chemical reaction rates and reaction mechanisms.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

1/ On this day, 19 June 1986, the first monoclonal antibody was approved as a drug for use in humans. Orthoclone OKT3 was approved as an immunosuppressant drug to reduce patients' rejection of their kidney transplants.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

1/ Ernst B Chain was born in Berlin, Germany, 19 June 1906. Chain was a Jewish biochemist who sought refuge in England from the Nazis in 1933. In the late 1930s he helped determine the therapeutic action of penicillin and that it could cure bacterial infections.

120

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

1/ Charles L Alphonse Laveran was born in Paris, France, 18 June 1845. Laveran was a physician who was one of the first to show protozoan parasites were the cause of disease. He first made the link in 1880 after finding parasites in a blood smear taken from a patient who had just died from malaria.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

1/ Jerome Karle was born in Brooklyn, NY, USA, 18 June 1918. Karle was a crystallographer who helped to develop mathematical equations to determine the molecular structure of molecular chemical compounds based on the patterns they form when x-rays get diffracted by their crystals.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

1/ Jan Vilcek was born in Bratislava, Slovakia, 17 June 1933. Vilcek is an immunologist who helped develop methods for the molecular characterisation of the cytokine human interferon and for its production for clinical use.

101

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

Francois Jacob was born in Nancy, France, 17 June 1920. Together with Jacques Monod, Jacob provided the first evidence of the existence and role of an intermediary molecule, now known as messenger RNA.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

1/ Susan LaFlesche Picotte was born on the Omaha Reservation, USA, 17 June 1865. Picotte was the first Native American woman to gain a medical degree in the USA.

111

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

1/ Barbara McClintock was born in Hartford CT, USA, 16 June 1902. McClintock was a pioneer in the field of cytogenetics, a branch of genetics concerned with how chromosomes affect cell behaviour.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

1/ Fritz A Lipmann born in Koenigsberg (now Kaliningrad), Germany (now Russia), 12 June 1899. Lipmann was a biochemist who shared the 1953 #NobelPrize for Medicine for the discovery of coenzyme A.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

1/ Bert Sakmann was born in Stuttgart, Germany, 12 June 1942. Sakmann is a cell physiologist and leading researcher in the field of cellular and membrane biology. He shared the #NobelPrize in Physiology or Medicine in 1991 for helping to uncover the function of single ion channels in cells.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

1/ Eric F Wieschaus was born in South Bend, Indiana, USA, 8 June 1947. Wieschaus is an evolutionary developmental biologist who shared the 1995 #NobePrize for Medicine for research into genetic controls during early embryonic development.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

1/ Robert F Furchgott was born 4 June 1916 in Charleston, SC, USA. A biochemist, Furchgott showed the signalling function of nitric oxide in the cardiovascular system. In 1966 he noticed a substance in cells on the interior surface of blood vessels were capable of relaxing the blood vessels.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

1/ Aristides Agramonte y Simoni was born 3 June 1868 in Camaguey, Cuba. Agramonte was a physician, pathologist and bacteriologist who discovered the role of the mosquito in the transmission of yellow fever in 1901.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

1/ Otto Loewi was born 3 June 1873 in Frankfurt-on-the-Main, Germany. Loewi was a pharmacologist and physician. He is credited with the discovery of the first neurotransmitter, acetylcholine, in the brain.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

1/ Charles R Drew was born 3 June 1904 in Washington DC, USA. An African-American physician and surgeon, Drew specialised in blood transfusion. He helped improve techniques for blood storage and the development of large-scale blood banks in the early part of the Second World War.

111

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

1/ Werner Arber was born 3 June 1929 in Granichen, Switzerland. A geneticist and microbiologist, Arber shared the 1978 #NobelPrize in 1978 for helping to discover restriction enzymes and showing their application in molecular genetics

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

1/ Max Sterne was born 1st June 1905 in Trieste, Austria. Sterne pioneered a vaccine against anthrax in 1935 which effectively wiped out the disease.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

1/ Stanley B Prusiner was born 28 May 1942 in Des Moines, Iowa, USA. Prusiner is a biochemist and neurologist who is known for his discovery of prions in 1982, a class of proteins he believed caused infections by improper protein folding, resulting in fatal disease in the brain and neural tissue.

210

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

1/ Edwin R Lankester was born 15 May 1847 in London, UK. Lankester was a zoologist and evolutionary biologist who was one of the first to discover protozoan parasites in the blood of vertebrates.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

1/ Dorothy M Crowfoot Hodgkin was born 12 May 1910 in Cairo, Egypt. She was a British chemist who pioneered protein crystallography, a technique the uses x-ray crystallography to determine the three dimensional structure of protein crystals.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

1/ Robert Koffler Jarvik was born 11 May 1946 in Midland, Michigan, USA. Jarvik is a medical scientist best known for having invented the first artificial heart used as a permanent replacement for a natural heart.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

1/ H Robert Horvitz was born 8 May 1947 in Chicago IL, USA. Horvitz is a biologist who shared the 2002 #NobelPrize for Medicine for discoveries into how genes regulate tissue and organ development through cell death.

120

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

1/ Andre Lwoff was born 8 May 1902 in Ainay-le-Chateau, France. Lwoff was a microbiologist. He shared the 1965 #NobelPrize for Medicine for 'discoveries concerning genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis'.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

1/ Sidney Altman was born 7 May 1939 in Montreal, Canada. Altman was a molecular biologist who shared the 1989 #NobelPrize for Chemistry for discovering the catalytic properties of RNA.

110

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

1/ Paul C Lauterbur was born 6 May 1929 in Sidney, Ohio, USA. Lauterbur was an American chemist who is credited with the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for scanning the body for diagnosis.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

1/ Hans Kosterlitz was born 27 April 1903 in Berlin, Germany. Kosterlitz was a phamacologist whose initial career focused on investigating carbohydrate metabolism.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

1/ Andrew Z Fire was born 27 April 1959. A biologist, pathologist and geneticist, in 1998 Fire he and other colleagues reported the discovery of tiny snippets of double-stranded RNA (dsRNA).

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

1/ Rita Levi-Montalcini was born 22 April 1909 in Turin, Italy. Levi-Montalcini is best known for sharing the Nobel Prize in 1986 for helping to discover and isolate the nerve growth factor which helps regulate the growth, maintenance, proliferation and survival of certain neurons.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 17/04/2026

1/ Georges Kohler was born 17 April 1946 in Munich, Germany. Together with Cesar Milstein, Kohler developed the first unlimited supply of long-lasting monoclonal antibodies. Their technique now underpins the development and application of many diagnostics and therapeutics.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

1/ Carol W Greider was born 15 April 1961 in San Diego CA, USA. She is known for her discovery of telomerase, an enzyme made up of protein and RNA subunits that help elongate and protect chromosomes. The enzyme is found in fetal tissues, adult germ cells and also tumour cells.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

1/ Michael S Brown was born 13 April 1941 in New York, USA. Brown is a geneticist who shared the 1985 #NobelPrize with Joseph L Goldstein for discovering how cholesterol metabolism is regulated.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

1/ Bernardo Alberto Houssay was born 10 April 1887 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Houssay was a physiologist who discovered how the pituitary gland regulates glucose or blood sugar levels. his he determined while studying the pituitary gland in dogs and toads during the early 1940s.

100

WhatIsBiotechnology @wibiotechnology.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

1/ Robert Burns Woodward was born 10 April 1917 in Boston MA, USA. An organic chemist, Woodward who won the 1965 #NobelPrize in Chemistry for opening up the field of artificial synthesis.

110