RUDOLF JAENISCH IS a member of the White—head Institute and Professor of Biology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, MA). Jaenisch's long and impressive career has focused mainly on epigenetic mechanisms in cells. The study of epigenetics relates to understanding how environmental factors surrounding the cell alters gene expression without changing the DNA sequence and what impact this has on the function and development of a cell. To do this Jaenisch has used a range of tools including stem cells, genetically altered mice and cloning techniques.

Jaenisch was born in 1942 in Germany. Jaenisch enrolled in a medical program and pursued additional research opportunities in a leading German laboratory of P. H. Hofschneider where he produced some seminal work studying bacterio—phages. He did the rest of ...