David J. Galas
Open-knowledge reference entry
David John Galas (February 25, 1944 – May 27, 2023) was a molecular biologist, notable for his scientific discoveries, founder role in biotechnology firms, and leadership role at the U.S. Department of Energy in the Human Genome Project.
Early life and education
The son of an American military officer stationed in London, UK, Galas grew up in Englefield Green, a village west of London, attending local English schools. His early interest in the natural world and science developed while exploring the English countryside.
Returning to the United States for college, he attended the University of California, Berkeley, receiving a Bachelor of Arts (AB) in physics in 1967. On recommendation of physicist Edward Teller, he was awarded a Hertz Foundation fellowship for graduate study at the University of California, Davis, where he received a PhD in theoretical physics in 1972 and subsequently became a staff member at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).
Early Academic Career
While at LLNL, Galas transitioned from physics to molecular biology, collaborating with Elbert Branscomb on protein synthesis research. From 1977 to 1981 he was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Geneva in the lab of Jeffrey H. Miller. With Albert Schmitz he discovered the DNase footprinting assay method.
Galas returned to the United States in 1981 to join the faculty at the University of Southern California (USC), rising to the rank of professor and eventually chair of the Molecular Biology Section, holding the Ester Dornsife Chair in Biological Sciences.
Human Genome Project
In 1990, Galas took a leave of absence to serve as director of the Office of Biological and Environmental Research at the U.S. Department of Energy.
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This entry incorporates text from “David J. Galas” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.