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Scrivener Publishing
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Publishers at Scrivener
Martin Scrivener (martin@scrivenerpublishing.com)
Phillip Carmical (pcarmical@scrivenerpublishing.com)

Diatoms: Fundamentals and Applications

 

 

 

Edited by

Joseph Seckbach

and

Richard Gordon

 

 

 

 

 

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Dedication to Lawrence Bogorad

Lawrence Bogorad, born on August 21, 1921 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, came to the USA at the age of two and passed away on December 28, 2003. He served as a professor in the Botany Department at the University of Chicago for 14 years (from 1953 to 1967) and in the Biology Department at Harvard University for 34 years.

At the University of Chicago he pioneered the molecular biology of chloroplast biogenesis, and investigated the photosynthetic pigments. He studied (after the discovery and publication of DNA in chloroplasts), the endosymbiotic ancestor from cyanobacteria as the contributors of the chloroplast DNA. At Harvard, he continued his investigation on the molecular biology of the photosynthetic apparatus.

Laurie (his nickname among his colleagues, although I preferred to always approach him by his University title,) was involved in many scientific societies, among them the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (where he served a term as President) and the National Academy of Sciences (Merchant, 2009), and served on the editorial board of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Bogorad received many awards for his studies.

In the personal sphere, he was warm and friendly, full of optimism. His lab was home to five decades of graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and visiting scientists—all benefiting from his training of them.

Here are some recollections of the four years I spent under the ‘wings’ of Professor Lawrence Bogorad at the University of Chicago. He was my mentor for my MSc and PhD (Seckbach, Bogorad and McIlrath, 1966; Rodermel, Viret and Krebbers, 2005). He welcomed me to the Botany Department at the end of 1961 when I first appeared at the gates of the University. During that interview, we planned my first-year program as a graduate student. Later on, he organized a research assistantship for me so I could continue with my graduate work. As a supportive professor close to his students, he shared with me the latest news on scientific updates in botany and even astrobiology.

Later on, when I was involved in a project on the possibilities of “Life on Venus” at UCLA in 1968 with Professor W. F. Libby (Seckbach and Libby, 1970), I approached him, among others, for advice on growing algae under high CO2 and elevated temperatures. Bogorad suggested that I try the red alga Cyanidium caldarium (his “favorite alga”) for my Venus project, and his advice worked very well. Therefore, I have to give him great credit for his guidance and for my finally changing my focus from plant physiology to the new field of astrobiology, and asked him to write the foreword for a book on Cyanidium (Bogorad, 1994).

During the subsequent years, I visited him at his lab in Harvard and he hosted evenings in his home in Lexington, Massachusetts. Sometimes he even waited for my arrival at the train station and took me to his home. When he visited Israel and presented a seminar at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, he introduced me to his mother, and I drove his wife Rosalyn on a tour of Jerusalem. I had warm feelings toward Bogorad and his family, considered him a colleague and a dear friend and dedicate this volume to his memory.

Joseph Seckbach, PhD University of Chicago, 1965; currently retired from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem; home address: P.O.B. 1132, Efrat, 90435, Israel [seckbach@huji.ac.il].

References

Bogorad, L. (1994) Foreword. In: Evolutionary Pathways and Enigmatic Algae: Cyanidium caldarium (Rhodophyta) and Related Cells. J. Seckbach, (ed.) Springer Science +Business Media, B.V., Dordrecht: pp. ix–x.

Merchant, S.S. (2009) Lawrence Bogorad, 1921-2003, A Biographical Memoir. U.S. National Academy of Science, Washington, DC, USA.

Rodermel, S., Viret, J.-F. and Krebbers, E. (2005) Lawrence Bogorad (1921–2003), a pioneer in photosynthesis research: a tribute. Photosynthesis Research 83(1), 17–24.

Seckbach, J., Bogorad, L. and McIlrath, W.J. (1966) Xanthinin deacylase: A new enzyme from xanthium. In: Plant Physiology. American Society of Plant Physiologists, Rockville, MD, USA: p. R67.

Seckbach, J. and Libby, W.F. (1970) Vegetative life on Venus? Or investigations with algae which grow under pure CO2 in hot acid media at elevated pressures. Space Life Sciences 2(2), 121–143.