By Meenakshi Narayanan
The history of biochemistry revolves around the idea of placing biological phenomena on chemical foundations. However, before chemistry could contribute to medicine and agriculture, it had to evade its immediate practical demands in order to become pure science.
17th Century
The origin of biochemistry began with the invention of the microscope in 1665. Robert Hooke, the inventor, was the first person ever to have seen a magnified view of a cell. However, the cell walls observed by Hooke gave no indication of the nucleus and other organelles found in most living cells. This was also the dawn of structural biology.
18th Century
In 1775, Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, the father of chemistry, alongside John Mayow, observed the fundamental analogy between the respiration of an animal and the oxidation of organic matter in air. Then, when Lavoisier carried out his fundamental studies he made the connection between chemical oxidation and the respiratory process. Predominantly because they were essentially the reverse of each other.
Two years later, in 1777, the Phlogiston Theory dominated chemistry for six continuous years. In this principle, the phenomenon of burning, now called oxidation, was caused by the liberation of phlogiston, a substance supposed by 18th-century chemists to exist in all combustible bodies, with the dephlogistigated substance left as an ash or residue.
The 18th century marked the onset of physiological chemistry, a sub-field of chemistry that deals with extra cellular chemistry, such as the chemistry of respiration.
19th Century
In 1836, Theodore Schwann, proposed that the process of fermentation is solely limited to living yeast cells. Justus von Liebig, did not agree to this and instead, he proposed another alternative theory, that fermentation was largely a process of decomposition as a consequence of the exposure of yeast to air and water. However, in 1856 Louis Pasteur opposed Liebig’s theory. In his experiment he showed that fermentation depends highly on physiological functions that occur in bacteria and in living yeast cells.
The 19th century was a pivotal point in Biochemistry’s history as chemists finally acknowledged the similarities between the chemistry of life and the chemistry of nonliving things. During this period, the view is that the protoplasm carries out all the intracellular processes. These include respiration, biosynthesis of molecules, and the breakdown of matter. It was also the time where the field metabolism began to develop.
20th Century up to the present
The 20th century was the year “Biochemistry” officially got its name from the German chemist, Carl Neuber!
Moreover, in 1919, Phoebus Levene, first discovered the order of the three major components of a single nucleotide: phosphate, pentose sugar, nitrogenous base. He was also the first to discover the carbohydrate component of RNA (ribose), and carbohydrate component of DNA (deoxyribose). Years later, Levene finally identified how DNA and RNA molecules are joined.
Erwin Chargaff began to challenge Levene’s previous conclusions in 1950. He noted that the nucleotide composition of DNA differs among species and does not repeat in the same order. Hargaff concluded that almost all DNA, no matter what organism or tissue type it comes from, still maintains certain properties, even as its composition varies. He postulated the “Chargaff’s Rule” which says that the amount of cytosine is equal to the amount of guanine, and the amount of thymine is equal to the amount of adenine. In short, the total amount of pyrimidines (thymine and cytosine) approximates the number of purines (adenine and guanine). After that, the process of replicating the DNA was suggested.
Following the discovery of the genetic material, the next milestone was the cracking of the genetic code in 1961. Frederick Sanger discovered that the genetic code is made up of specific triplets of DNA bases that codes for particular amino acids.
Sixteen years after the discovery of the triplets of the DNA, Sanger successfully sequenced the genome of a bacteriophage which contained more than 5000 nucleotides. Not long after, he was able to sequence the DNA of the human mitochondrial genome which consisted of more than 16000 nucleotides.
In the present time, Biochemistry has promised to the world of science the development of new breaking research and coming times would surely prove these promises to be fulfilled. The development of new technology such as X-ray diffraction, chromatography, radioisotopic labelling, electron microscopy and molecular dynamics has paved the way for many other discoveries in the field of Biochemistry. Such technologies will also further open several new endeavours in the future.
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