Moselio Schaechter
Moselio Schaechter | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1928 |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Bacteriology, microbiology |
| Institutions | Tufts University |
Moselio "Elio" Schaechter is a professor emeritus at Tufts University, adjunct professor emeritus at San Diego State University, and visiting scholar at University of California, San Diego. His work focuses on microbiology.
Early life and education
Schaechter was born in 1928 in Milan, Italy and is of Polish Jewish descent. His family emigrated in 1940 to Quito, Ecuador, where he was raised and educated until moving to the United States for graduate school. In Quito, he studied at Instituto Nacional Mejía, the most prestigious Ecuadorian school. He received a M.A. in bacteriology from the University of Kansas in 1952 and a Ph.D. in microbiology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1954. He was drafted into the United States Army after graduation and worked at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research studying rickettsia. He then worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen, Denmark until 1958, studying Salmonella and Escherichia coli growth.[1][2]
Academic career
Returning to the United States to begin his independent research career, Schaechter spent four years at the then-new medical school at the University of Florida before moving to Tufts University, where he would remain for the following 33 years. During his tenure at Tufts, Schaechter spend 23 years serving as chair of the Department of Molecular Biology and Microbiology, became a Distinguished Professor in 1987, and received the medical students' teaching award 11 times. Schaechter retired from Tufts in 1995 and moved to San Diego, California, where he has served as an adjunct professor and visiting scholar at San Diego State University and University of California, San Diego.[1]
Schaechter became a fellow of the American Society for Microbiology in 1974, served a term as the academy's president in 1985-6, and was a member of its board of governors from 1997 to 2000. He has also chaired the editorial board of its newsletter, ASM News, since 1999. Schaechter has written or edited several foundational textbooks in microbiology.[3][4] The ASM awards the Moselio Schaechter Distinguished Service Award to recognize society members who contribute to scientific research and science education in the developing world.[5]
Schaechter has also been involved with public outreach and science communication projects; he co-edits an ASM-sponsored microbiology-themed blog called Small Things Considered[6] and co-hosts the This Week in Microbiology podcast founded and hosted by Vincent Racaniello.[7] He also publishes work on the history of microbiology.[8][9]
Research
The focus of Schaechter's research group involved studying bacterial growth and cell division, with particular interest in the involvement of bacterial cell membranes in division. Among the notable discoveries of the group was the association of the E. coli origin of replication with the cell membrane when hemimethylated.[1][10]
Personal life
Schaechter married during his graduate education and he and his wife had two children. His daughter Judith Schaechter is a noted stained glass artist. After his first wife's death Schaechter remarried in 1994.
Schaechter is a hobbyist mycologist and has received awards for his contributions to amateur mycology. He was active in the Boston Mycological Club for many years and is a founding member of the San Diego Mycological Society.[1] He published a natural history book on the subject of mushrooms and mushroom-hunting, In the Company of Mushrooms, in 1997.[11]
External links
- Elio's Memoirs
- Small Things Considered
- People Behind the Science Podcast - interview with Schaechter, August 21, 2015
- An Interview with the Editor-in-Chief of 'The Encyclopedia of Microbiology' - interview with Schaechter, 2010
References
- ^ a b c d "Adjunct Faculty - Moselio Schaechter". San Diego State University. Retrieved 1 November 2016.
- ^ Schaechter, Moselio. "Elio's Memoirs". Retrieved 1 November 2016.
- ^ Schaechter, Moselio, ed. (2009). Encyclopedia of microbiology (3rd ed.). [S.l.]: Elsevier. ISBN 978-0-12-373944-5.
- ^ Schaechter, Moselio, ed. (2012). Eukaryotic microbes. Amsterdam: Elsevier/Academic Press. ISBN 978-0-12-383876-6.
- ^ "Moselio Schaechter Distinguished Service Award". American Society for Microbiology. Retrieved 1 November 2016.
- ^ "About Small Things Considered". Small Things Considered. Retrieved 1 November 2016.
- ^ "This Week in Microbiology". Microbe World. Retrieved 1 November 2016.
- ^ Schaechter, Moselio (21 April 2015). "A brief history of bacterial growth physiology". Frontiers in Microbiology. 6. doi:10.3389/fmicb.2015.00289.
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link) - ^ Schaechter, M.; The View From Here Group (1 March 2001). "Escherichia coli and Salmonella 2000: the View From Here". Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews. 65 (1): 119–130. doi:10.1128/MMBR.65.1.119-130.2001. PMC 99021.
- ^ Ogden, GB; Pratt, MJ; Schaechter, M (1 July 1988). "The replicative origin of the E. coli chromosome binds to cell membranes only when hemimethylated". Cell. 54 (1): 127–35. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(88)90186-9. PMID 2838178.
- ^ Schaechter, Elio (1997). In the company of mushrooms : a biologist's tale (1st paperback ed.). Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674445543.
