Salvador Luria

Salvador Edward Luria (born Salvatore Luria;

August 13, 1912 – February 6, 1991) was an Italian Salvador Luria
microbiologist, later a naturalized U.S. citizen. He won
the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969,
with Max Delbrück and Alfred Hershey, for their
discoveries on the replication mechanism and the
genetic structure of viruses. Salvador Luria also
showed that bacterial resistance to viruses (phages) is
genetically inherited.
Luria c. 1969
Born Salvatore Luria
Biography August 13, 1912
Turin, Kingdom of Italy
Died February 6, 1991 (aged 78)
Early life Lexington, Massachusetts, U.S.
Luria was born Salvatore Luria in Turin, Italy to an Nationality Italian
influential Italian Sephardi Jewish family. His parents American (since 1950)
were Davide and Ester (Sacerdote) Luria.[1] He Alma mater University of Turin
attended the medical school at the University of Turin
Spouse Zella Luria ​(m. 1945)​
studying with Giuseppe Levi. There, he met two other
future Nobel laureates: Rita Levi-Montalcini and Children 1
Renato Dulbecco. He graduated from the University of Awards John Simon Guggenheim
Turin in 1935 and never got a master's degree or a PhD Memorial Fellowship (1942)
as they were not contemplated by the Italian high Nobel Prize in Physiology or
educational system (which, on the other hand, was Medicine (1969)
very selective). From 1936 to 1937, Luria served his Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize
required time in the Italian army as a medical officer. (1969)
He then took classes in radiology at the University of Scientific career
Rome. Here, he was introduced to Max Delbrück's
Fields Molecular biology
theories on the gene as a molecule and began to
formulate methods for testing genetic theory with the Institutions Columbia University
bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria. Indiana University
University of Illinois Urbana–
In 1938, he received a fellowship to study in the Champaign
United States, where he intended to work with Massachusetts Institute of
Delbrück. Soon after Luria received the award, Benito Technology
Mussolini's fascist regime banned Jews from academic Doctoral James D. Watson
research fellowships. Without funding sources for students Jon Kabat-Zinn
work in the U.S. or Italy, Luria left his home country for Paris, France in 1938. As the Nazi German
armies invaded France in 1940, Luria fled on bicycle to Marseille where he received an immigration visa
to the United States.

Phage research
Luria arrived in New York City on September 12, 1940, and soon
changed his first and middle names. With the help of physicist
Enrico Fermi, whom he knew from his time at the University of
Rome, Luria received a Rockefeller Foundation fellowship at
Columbia University. He soon met Delbrück and Hershey, and
they collaborated on experiments at Cold Spring Harbor
Laboratory and in Delbrück's lab at Vanderbilt University.[2]

His famous experiment with Delbrück in 1943,[3][4] known as the Salvador Luria with Esther
Luria–Delbrück experiment, demonstrated statistically that Lederberg at the 1953 Cold Spring
Harbor Symposium. In the
inheritance in bacteria must follow Darwinian rather than
background are Aaron Novick,
Lamarckian principles and that mutant bacteria occurring
Bruce Stocker, Haig Papazian and
randomly can still bestow viral resistance without the virus being Geraldine Lindegren.
present. The idea that natural selection affects bacteria has
profound consequences, for example, it explains how bacteria
develop antibiotic resistance.

Luria and Latarjet in 1947 published a quantitative analysis on the effect of ultraviolet irradiation on
bacteriophage multiplication during intracellular growth.[5] During the early course of infection they
found an increase in bacteriophage resistance to ultraviolet irradiation and then later a decrease. At the
time this pattern, known as the Luria-Laterjet effect, was published little was known about the central role
of DNA in biology. Later work established that multiple specific DNA repair pathways, encoded by the
infecting bacteriophage, contribute to the increase in UV resistance early in infection.[6]

From 1943 to 1950, he worked at Indiana University. His first graduate student was James D. Watson,
who went on to discover the structure of DNA with Francis Crick. In January 1947, Luria became a
naturalized citizen of the United States.

In 1950, Luria moved to the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign. In the early 1950s, Luria and
Giuseppe Bertani discovered the phenomenon of host-controlled restriction and modification of a
bacterial virus: a culture of E. coli can significantly reduce the production of phages grown in other
strains; however, once the phage become established in that strain, they also become restricted in their
ability to grow in other strains.[7][8] It was later discovered by other researchers that bacteria produce
enzymes that cut viral DNA at particular sequences but not the bacteria's own DNA, which is protected
by methylation. These enzymes became known as restriction enzymes and developed into one of the main
molecular tools in molecular biology.[9]

Luria won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969, with Max Delbrück and Alfred Hershey,
for their discoveries on the replication mechanism and the genetic structure of viruses.[10]

Later work
In 1959, he became chair of Microbiology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). At MIT,
he switched his research focus from phages to cell membranes and bacteriocins. While on sabbatical in
1963 to study at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, he found that bacteriocins impair the function of cell
membranes. Returning to MIT, his lab discovered that bacteriocins achieve this impairment by forming
holes in the cell membrane, allowing ions to flow through and destroy the electrochemical gradient of
cells. In 1972, he became chair of The Center for Cancer Research at MIT. The department he established
included future Nobel Prize winners David Baltimore, Susumu Tonegawa, Phillip Allen Sharp and H.
Robert Horvitz.

In addition to the Nobel Prize, Luria received a number of awards and recognitions. He was elected to the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1959.[11] He was named a member of the National Academy
of Sciences in 1960.[12] In 1964, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society.[13] From 1968 to
1969, he served as president of the American Society for Microbiology. In 1969, he was awarded the
Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize from Columbia University together with Max Delbrück, co-winner with
Luria of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1969. In the U.S. he won the 1974 National Book
Award in Science for his popular science book Life: the Unfinished Experiment[14] and received the
National Medal of Science in 1991.[15]

Political activism
Throughout his career, Luria was an outspoken political advocate.[16][17] He joined with Linus Pauling in
1957 to protest against nuclear weapon testing. Luria was an opponent of the Vietnam War and a
supporter of organized labor. In the 1970s, he was involved in debates over genetic engineering,
advocating a compromise position of moderate oversight and regulation rather than the extremes of a
complete ban or full scientific freedom. Due to his political involvement, he was blacklisted from
receiving funding from the National Institutes of Health for a short time in 1969.

Noam Chomsky describes him as a friend, and claims that Luria attempted to influence Jewish American
writer Elie Wiesel's public stance on Israel.[1][18]

Death
Luria died in Lexington, Massachusetts of a heart attack on 6 February, 1991 at the age of 78.

See also
List of Jewish Nobel laureates
Phage group
Luria–Delbrück experiment

References
1. "FREE Essay on The Life of Salvador Luria" (https://web.archive.org/web/20131015183907/
http://www.directessays.com/viewpaper/78978.html). www.directessays.com. Archived from
the original (http://www.directessays.com/viewpaper/78978.html) on 2013-10-15.
 2. Witkin, Evelyn M. (October 2002). "Chances and Choices: Cold Spring Harbor 1944–1955"
(https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/full/10.1146/annurev.micro.56.012302.161130). Annual
Review of Microbiology. 56 (1): 1–15. doi:10.1146/annurev.micro.56.012302.161130 (https://
doi.org/10.1146%2Fannurev.micro.56.012302.161130). ISSN 0066-4227 (https://search.wor
ldcat.org/issn/0066-4227). PMID 12142497 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12142497).
Retrieved 6 March 2023.
3. Luria SE, Delbrück M. Mutations of bacteria from virus sensitivity to virus resistance.
Genetics. 1943 Nov;28(6):491-511. doi:10.1093/genetics/28.6.491 (https://doi.org/10.1093%
2Fgenetics%2F28.6.491). PMID 17247100 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17247100);
PMC 1209226 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1209226/)
4. Luria SE "Mutations of bacteria and bacteriophage" in Phage and the Origins of Molecular
Biology (2007) Edited by John Cairns, Gunther S. Stent, and James D. Watson, Cold Spring
Harbor Laboratory of Quantitative Biology, Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island, New York, pgs.
173-179. ISBN 978-0-87969-800-3
5. Luria SE, Latarjet R. Ultraviolet Irradiation of Bacteriophage During Intracellular Growth. J
Bacteriol. 1947 Feb;53(2):149-63. doi: 10.1128/jb.53.2.149-163.1947. PMID: 16561258;
PMCID: PMC518289
6. Hyman P. The genetics of the Luria-Latarjet effect in bacteriophage T4: evidence for the
involvement of multiple DNA repair pathways. Genet Res. 1993 Aug;62(1):1-9. doi:
10.1017/s0016672300031499. PMID: 8405988
7. Luria SE, Human ML (Oct 1952). "A nonhereditary, host-induced variation of bacterial
viruses" (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC169391). Journal of Bacteriology.
64 (4): 557–69. doi:10.1128/JB.64.4.557-569.1952 (https://doi.org/10.1128%2FJB.64.4.557-
569.1952). PMC 169391 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC169391).
PMID 12999684 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12999684).
8. Bertani G, Weigle JJ (Feb 1953). "Host controlled variation in bacterial viruses" (https://www.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC169650). Journal of Bacteriology. 65 (2): 113–21.
doi:10.1128/JB.65.2.113-121.1953 (https://doi.org/10.1128%2FJB.65.2.113-121.1953).
PMC 169650 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC169650). PMID 13034700 (htt
ps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/13034700).
9. Roberts RJ (April 2005). "How restriction enzymes became the workhorses of molecular
biology" (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1087929). Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci.
U.S.A. 102 (17): 5905–8. Bibcode:2005PNAS..102.5905R (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/ab
s/2005PNAS..102.5905R). doi:10.1073/pnas.0500923102 (https://doi.org/10.1073%2Fpnas.
0500923102). PMC 1087929 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1087929).
PMID 15840723 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15840723).
10. "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1969" (https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/
medicine/laureates/1969/). Nobel Foundation.
11. "Salvador Edward Luria" (https://www.amacad.org/person/salvador-edward-luria). American
Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved 2022-10-11.
12. "S. E. Luria" (http://www.nasonline.org/member-directory/deceased-members/20000523.htm
l). www.nasonline.org. Retrieved 2022-10-11.
13. "APS Member History" (https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Salvador+E.+
Luria&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=adva
nced). search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2022-10-11.
14. "National Book Awards – 1974" (https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-
awards-1974). National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-07.
15. "Salvador E. Luria" (https://www.nsf.gov/od/nms/recip_details.cfm?recip_id=224). The
President's National Medal of Science: Recipient Details. National Science Foundation.
Retrieved 2012-03-07.
16. Luria SE. A Slot Machine, a Broken Test Tube. An Autobiography. Chapter 9. “In the political
arena” pgs. 166-207, Harper and Row, New York, 1984. Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Series
17. Selya, Rena (2022). Salvador Luria. An Immigrant Biologist in Cold War America (https://mit
press.mit.edu/9780262046466/salvador-luria/). The MIT Press. ISBN 9780262046466.
18. Chomsky, Noam (2015-02-16). "Noam Chomsky: America paved the way for ISIS" (https://w
ww.salon.com/2015/02/16/noam_chomsky_america_paved_the_way_for_isis_partner/).
Salon. Retrieved 2024-08-19.

"The Salvador E. Luria Papers" (https://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/QL/). Profiles in Science.

National Library of Medicine. Retrieved 2007-09-22.

External links
The Official Site of Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize (http://www.cumc.columbia.edu/horwitz/)
The Salvador E. Luria Papers (https://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/QL/) - Profiles in Science,
National Library of Medicine
Salvador E. Luria (https://www.nobelprize.org/laureate/393) on Nobelprize.org

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