Skip to content
Nobel Jews
Portrait of Daniel Nathans
Photo: Willy Pragher, Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg, Abt. Staatsarchiv Freiburg, W 134 Nr. 125411c · CC BY 3.0 de via Wikimedia Commons

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine · 1978

Daniel Nathans

He showed that bacterial enzymes could cut DNA into exact, mappable pieces, the first step behind gene cloning, testing and sequencing.

The Nobel citation: “for the discovery of restriction enzymes and their application to problems of molecular genetics”
Born
October 30, 1928, Wilmington, DE, USA
Died
November 16, 1999, Baltimore, MD, USA
Shared with
Werner Arber, Hamilton O. Smith
Affiliation at the time
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, USA

Medicine prize

1978

Shared with 2 other laureates.

Age that year

50years

Born in 1928.

Headline credited impact

$15–20billion in economic value

Cumulative global sales of genetically engineered non-antibody protein medicines (a proxy for economic activity). How it was built

Sources cited

26

Fact-checked September 24, 2026.

  • Nathans never earned a PhD. He quit a doctoral program at the Rockefeller Institute because he did not want to sit through more lectures, and did research anyway.
  • He learned of Hamilton Smith's DNA-cutting enzyme from a letter that reached him in 1969, while he was on sabbatical at the Weizmann Institute in Israel.
  • Told he had won the Nobel Prize, he wanted independent confirmation first, then put off celebrations until he had taught his scheduled lab session for medical students.
  • A 1971 seminar by Nathans led Richard Roberts to drop his research plans and study restriction enzymes. Roberts later shared the 1993 Nobel Prize for split genes.
  • The youngest child of Russian Jewish immigrants, he grew up in the Depression in a leaky, poorly heated house; he later learned his parents sometimes went without food.

The breakthrough

Using restriction enzymes to cut and map DNA (1971-1973)

DNA is a very long molecule, and in the late 1960s biologists had no reliable way to cut it into the same pieces every time. Bacteria make enzymes that defend them against viruses by chopping up foreign DNA. Werner Arber had proposed that these restriction enzymes act at particular short sequences of DNA letters, and in 1970 Hamilton Smith, his Johns Hopkins colleague, purified one that cuts wherever a specific six-letter sequence appears. Smith was not much interested in how it might be used. Nathans saw a tool. He tried the enzyme on the DNA of SV40, a small monkey virus that can make cultured cells behave like tumor cells, and with his student Kathleen Danna ran the products through a gel, a slab of jelly that sorts DNA pieces by size. The virus DNA broke into 11 specific pieces. Think of a long ribbon with no markings: cut it wherever one particular pattern is printed, and you get the same set of lengths every time. By cutting with several different enzymes and working out how the pieces overlapped, Nathans's group ordered the fragments around the virus's ring of DNA. The result, published in 1973, was the first cleavage map of a virus's DNA. His lab then used the map to find where the virus starts copying its DNA and where its genes lie, and to make mutations at chosen spots. The 1971 paper also foresaw uses such as comparing DNA samples and preparing pieces for sequencing.[3],[4],[10],[11],[12],[13],[22]

“In our view, however, the future well-being of the human family depends on continuous creativity and new discovery.”
Daniel Nathans, Speaking for the three medicine laureates at the Nobel Banquet, Stockholm, 10 December 1978, in reply to public fears about the new genetics.[5]

What it meant for humanity

The Nobel Assembly's prize announcement called restriction enzymes chemical knives for genes, and Nathans showed how to use them. Richard Roberts, whose lab went on to find many more of these enzymes, recalled that after Nathans's work, labs everywhere rushed to map DNA with whatever enzymes they had. Cutting DNA and sorting the pieces became the first step in much of what followed. Early DNA sequencing leaned on restriction fragments: Frederick Sanger's lab used tiny ones as starting points, and the Maxam-Gilbert method used the enzymes to make labeled ends. Recombinant DNA depended on them too. In 1973 Stanley Cohen and Herbert Boyer cut two DNA molecules with the enzyme EcoRI so their ends matched, joined them, and grew the result in E. coli. That approach let bacteria and cells be programmed to make human proteins. Genetically engineered human insulin went on sale in 1982, and by 2022 US and European regulators had licensed 541 biopharmaceutical products. Restriction enzymes also opened up medical genetics. In 1978 Kan and Dozy found a variation in a restriction site near the beta-globin gene that often travels with the sickle-cell mutation and could help prenatal diagnosis. In 1980 Botstein and colleagues proposed mapping the human genome with such variations, so that families could get genetic counseling for inherited diseases. Alec Jeffreys later used differences in DNA fragment lengths for forensic identification. Demand grew so fast that New England Biolabs made selling restriction enzymes its main product line in 1975, and by 2005 more than 3,600 had been described. Roberts concluded that DNA diagnostics, DNA forensics and routine checks of DNA samples all grew out of the methods in the Danna and Nathans paper.

  • Danna and Nathans's 1971 paper showed that Smith's enzyme cut SV40 DNA into 11 specific pieces a gel could separate. Hearing Nathans present it led Richard Roberts, a future Nobel laureate, to make these enzymes a lifelong focus.[11],[13],[23]
  • New England Biolabs made restriction enzymes its main product line in 1975; by 2005 more than 3,600 had been described, recognizing over 250 different DNA sequences.[11]
  • In 1978 a restriction-site variation near the beta-globin gene was found to travel often with the sickle-cell mutation, offering a new way to predict the disease before birth.[20]
  • The 1973 Cohen-Boyer gene-cloning method cut DNA with the restriction enzyme EcoRI. Engineered human insulin went on sale in 1982, and US and European regulators had licensed 541 biopharmaceutical products by 2022.[11],[14],[16]
  • In 1980 Botstein and colleagues proposed a genetic map of the human genome built from restriction fragment length differences, so that DNA markers could be used in genetic counseling for inherited diseases.[21]
  • Nathans's lab used its restriction maps to locate where SV40 starts copying its DNA and where its genes lie, and to build virus mutants at chosen sites.[3],[7],[10]

Impact in numbers

Nathans's main gift was a method, and methods are hard to price. Cutting DNA with restriction enzymes and sorting the pieces by size became a starting point for gene mapping, early DNA sequencing, recombinant DNA, genetic diagnosis and forensic DNA testing. We record one modeled claim under the shared recombinant DNA outcome: cumulative sales of genetically engineered non-antibody protein medicines, such as insulin, used as a proxy for economic activity rather than benefit. We credit Nathans with 1%, because he showed how to use enzymes that others discovered, cloning used a different enzyme (EcoRI) found in Herbert Boyer's lab, and many others built the industry. We make no lives-saved claim: restriction-based diagnosis and forensics mattered, but their effects cannot be separated from later methods that superseded his lab's techniques. The deepest effect is on knowledge. His former student Daniel DiMaio wrote that it had become hard to imagine analyzing viruses and genes without the approaches pioneered in Nathans's lab.

HealthEconomyTechnologyFundamental science

Each number is the laureate’s credited share of a real-world outcome, cumulative to 2025. The whole outcome, the share of credit, and the reasoning are shown so you can check the arithmetic. Outcomes shared with other laureates are counted once on the impact page.

  • Low confidenceRippleModeledEconomy

    Cumulative global sales of genetically engineered non-antibody protein medicines (a proxy for economic activity)

    $15–20

    billion in economic value, credited share

    That is 1% of $1.5–2 trillion in economic value since 1982.

    How this number was built

    Same outcome and range as the Berg, Kornberg, Lederberg, Jacob, Luria and Lwoff profiles: world sales of recombinant non-antibody protein drugs since Humulin (1982). 2013 antibody sales ~$75B were about half of biopharma, so non-antibody ~$75B (Ecker 2015); 2021 non-antibody originators $53.6B, biosimilars $11.1B (Walsh 2022). Low: quadratic ramp 1982-2013 ($0.81T) + fall to $53.6B in 2014-21 ($0.50T) + flat 2022-25 ($0.21T) = ~$1.5T. High: linear ramp ($1.2T) + same later years + half of biosimilars = ~$2.0T. Nominal sales, not net benefit. Share 0.01 (~$15-20B): Nathans first showed type II restriction enzymes give specific, mappable DNA pieces (Roberts 2005), a basis of cloning; but Arber and Smith found the enzymes, Boyer's lab found EcoRI, and Berg (0.05), Kornberg (0.02), Cohen, Boyer and industry did the rest.[10],[11],[14],[15],[16]

    Sources: mAbs (via PubMed Central); Nature Biotechnology (via PubMed Central); J Community Hosp Intern Med Perspect (via PubMed Central); Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central); National Academy of Sciences

  • Low confidenceRippleModeledFood

    Extra farm income from genetically engineered crops, which all rely on recombinant DNA

    $1.3–1.5

    billion in economic value, credited share

    That is 0.3% of $440–490 billion in economic value since 1996.

    How this number was built

    Outcome: extra net farm income from genetically engineered crops, planted commercially since 1996; every one carries genes spliced with recombinant DNA. Brookes (2022, GM Crops & Food) totals $261.3B for 1996-2020 in nominal dollars, $18.8B in 2020 alone. Most gains came after 2008, so to 2024 dollars (BLS CPI) x1.32-1.44 (2015 and 2010 price levels) = $346-376B. 2021-25: 5 yr x $18.8B, low unadjusted ($94B), high x1.21 ($114B). Total about $440-490B. Caveats: the study was funded by Bayer Crop Science, and it counts farm income net of seed costs, not consumer, health or environmental effects. Share 0.003: vectors are built with the restriction mapping Nathans pioneered, but Arber and Smith found the enzymes, Berg (0.01) and Cohen-Boyer made recombinant DNA, and plant transformation, trait genes and seed firms did the rest. ~$1.3-1.5B.[7],[11],[24],[25],[26]

    Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics; Taylor & Francis (via PubMed Central); The World Food Prize Foundation; Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central); US National Library of Medicine

The double edge

Restriction enzymes harmed no one directly, but they made genetic engineering possible, and that raised real fears. In the early 1970s scientists worried that splicing genes for antibiotic resistance, toxins or cancer into harmless microbes might create new human pathogens. Nathans took those worries seriously. He signed the 1974 letter calling for a voluntary pause on certain recombinant DNA experiments, took part in the 1975 Asilomar conference, and took part in the NIH body that drew up the first safety guidelines. The feared new plagues did not appear; by 2004 Paul Berg reported no documented public-health hazard from the technology. Wider questions remained. Critics faulted Asilomar for setting aside biological warfare, genetic screening, human gene therapy and genetically modified crops. At the 1978 prize ceremony the Nobel presenter noted that Swedish television had claimed the laureates' work could be used to copy people or create criminals, and dismissed such fears as science fiction. Nathans argued at the banquet that scientists must explain their work more fully to the public. We found no misconduct or personal controversy linked to him.

  • Minor

    Fears of engineered germs, and a voluntary pause

    Splicing DNA across species raised fears that harmless lab microbes could be turned into human pathogens. Nathans signed the 1974 moratorium letter, attended the 1975 Asilomar conference and took part in the NIH body that wrote the first guidelines. The dangers proved far smaller than feared: by 2004 Berg reported no documented public-health hazard.[7],[10],[19]

  • Moderate

    Ethical and dual-use questions set aside

    Asilomar focused on lab and public-health risks. Critics said it ignored the chance that gene splicing could aid biological warfare, and the dilemmas of genetic screening, gene therapy in people and genetically modified crops. These debates continue; no source ties Nathans to any misuse.[19]

Against the odds

Nathans's story is less about persecution than about the immigrant poverty that many Jewish families of his generation worked their way out of. His parents belonged to a large emigration of Jews from the Russian Empire, where anti-Jewish riots known as pogroms had swept the southern and western provinces in 1881 to 1884. They came to the United States early in the 20th century seeking, as he put it, freedom and opportunity. His father had left home in his mid-teens, breaking with an Orthodox family. Nathans, the youngest child, was born in Wilmington, Delaware, in 1928, just before the Great Depression. His father soon lost his small business and was out of work for some time; the family home was leaky and poorly heated, and his parents sometimes went without food. From about age 10 Nathans worked after school, on weekends and in summers. At the University of Delaware he at first lived at home and hitchhiked to classes. He entered medical school in 1950. Quotas limiting Jewish students had been set up at most US medical schools in the 1920s and were firmly in place by 1945; they did not fully disappear until about 1970. He won a scholarship to Washington University in St. Louis, and no source we found says he was personally turned away. He remembered his childhood fondly and later called his career a privileged life.

  • —

    Other

    His parents left the Russian Empire early in the 20th century as part of a wave of Jewish immigrants seeking freedom and opportunity; pogroms had swept its southern and western provinces in 1881-1884. His father had broken with an Orthodox family.[2],[18]

  • —

    Poverty

    Soon after his birth in 1928, the Depression cost his father his small business and left him unemployed for some time. The family home was leaky and poorly heated, his parents sometimes went without food, and from about age 10 Nathans worked after school, on weekends and in summers.[2],[6]

  • 1950

    Quota

    He entered medical school in 1950, before the quotas on Jewish students that most US medical schools had adopted in the 1920s had fully ended (they were gone by about 1970). He won a scholarship to Washington University in St. Louis; no source says he was personally rejected because he was Jewish.[2],[17]

Jewish background

Both parents JewishCulturally Jewish

Nathans was the youngest child of Samuel and Sarah (Levitan) Nathans. In his Nobel autobiography he described them as part of a wave of Russian Jewish immigrants who came to the United States early in the 20th century seeking freedom and opportunity. His father had left home in his mid-teens, rebelling against an Orthodox family. The couple married in Philadelphia in 1910, and Nathans was born in Wilmington, Delaware. His National Academy of Sciences memoir and the National Library of Medicine also call his parents Russian Jewish immigrants. In 1969 he spent a sabbatical at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. We found no source describing his religious practice as an adult.[2],[6],[10],[12]

Key dates

  1. October 30, 1928

    Born in Wilmington, Delaware, the youngest child of Samuel and Sarah (Levitan) Nathans, Jewish immigrants from Russia.[1],[2],[6]

  2. 1950

    Earns a BS in chemistry from the University of Delaware, where he also studied philosophy and literature.[2],[6]

  3. 1954

    Receives his MD from Washington University in St. Louis, after a summer in Oliver Lowry's lab draws him toward research.[2],[9]

  4. 1955

    Becomes a clinical associate at the National Cancer Institute, caring for patients on experimental chemotherapy and studying myeloma tumors.[6],[9]

  5. 1959

    Joins Fritz Lipmann's lab at the Rockefeller Institute, where, working with Norton Zinder, he later shows that a phage's RNA can direct synthesis of its coat protein.[2],[9],[10]

  6. 1962

    Joins the microbiology department of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, recruited by his former teacher Barry Wood.[2],[6],[10]

  7. 1969

    On sabbatical at the Weizmann Institute in Israel, gets Hamilton Smith's letter about a DNA-cutting enzyme and plans to use it on SV40.[2],[3],[6]

  8. December 1971

    With student Kathleen Danna, publishes the PNAS paper showing that Smith's enzyme cuts SV40 DNA into 11 specific fragments.[11],[13]

  9. 1973

    His group publishes the first cleavage map of SV40 DNA, placing the fragments in order around the viral genome.[3],[4],[11]

  10. 1974

    Signs the letter in Science calling for a voluntary pause on certain recombinant DNA experiments until the risks are assessed.[7],[10]

  11. 1978

    Shares the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Werner Arber and Hamilton Smith.[1],[4],[22]

  12. 1993

    Receives the National Medal of Science.[6],[10]

  13. 1995

    Becomes interim president of Johns Hopkins University for a year, guiding a redefinition of ties between its medical school and hospital.[8],[10]

  14. November 16, 1999

    Dies of leukemia at home in Baltimore, aged 71, months after Hopkins named its McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine for him and Victor McKusick.[1],[6],[10]

Sources

  1. 1.Daniel Nathans - Facts · NobelPrize.org (Nobel Prize Outreach)
  2. 2.Daniel Nathans - Biographical (autobiography from Les Prix Nobel 1978) · NobelPrize.org, 1978
  3. 3.Restriction Endonucleases, Simian Virus 40, and the New Genetics (Nobel Lecture, 8 December 1978) · NobelPrize.org, 1978
  4. 4.The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1978 - Press release · The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet / NobelPrize.org, 1978
  5. 5.Daniel Nathans - Banquet speech, 10 December 1978 · NobelPrize.org, 1978
  6. 6.Biographical Overview - The Daniel Nathans Papers, Profiles in Science · US National Library of Medicine
  7. 7.Restriction Enzymes and the "New Genetics," 1970-1980 - The Daniel Nathans Papers, Profiles in Science · US National Library of Medicine
  8. 8.New Directions: Growth Signals and Cellular Responses, 1980-1999 - The Daniel Nathans Papers, Profiles in Science · US National Library of Medicine
  9. 9.Choosing Research, 1955-1962 - The Daniel Nathans Papers, Profiles in Science · US National Library of Medicine
  10. 10.Daniel Nathans, October 30, 1928-November 16, 1999 (Daniel DiMaio), Biographical Memoirs vol. 79 · National Academy of Sciences, 2001
  11. 11.How restriction enzymes became the workhorses of molecular biology (Roberts RJ), PNAS 102(17):5905-5908 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central), 2005
  12. 12.Danna and Nathans: Restriction enzymes and the boon to modern molecular biology (Brownlee C), PNAS 102(17):5909 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central), 2005
  13. 13.Specific cleavage of simian virus 40 DNA by restriction endonuclease of Hemophilus influenzae (Danna K, Nathans D), PNAS 68(12):2913-2917 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central), 1971
  14. 14.Biopharmaceutical benchmarks 2022 (Walsh G, Walsh E), Nature Biotechnology 40:1722-1760 · Nature Biotechnology (via PubMed Central), 2022
  15. 15.The therapeutic monoclonal antibody market (Ecker DM, Jones SD, Levine HL), mAbs 7(1):9-14 · mAbs (via PubMed Central), 2015
  16. 16.History of insulin (Quianzon CC, Cheikh I), Journal of Community Hospital Internal Medicine Perspectives 2(2) · J Community Hosp Intern Med Perspect (via PubMed Central), 2012
  17. 17.Why Did the United States Medical School Admissions Quota for Jews End? (Halperin EC), Am J Med Sci 358(5):317-325 · American Journal of the Medical Sciences (via PubMed), 2019
  18. 18.Pogroms, Holocaust Encyclopedia · United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
  19. 19.Asilomar and recombinant DNA (Paul Berg, 26 August 2004) · NobelPrize.org, 2004
  20. 20.Polymorphism of DNA sequence adjacent to human beta-globin structural gene: relationship to sickle mutation (Kan YW, Dozy AM), PNAS 75(11):5631-5635 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (via PubMed Central), 1978
  21. 21.Construction of a genetic linkage map in man using restriction fragment length polymorphisms (Botstein D, White RL, Skolnick M, Davis RW), Am J Hum Genet 32(3):314-331 · American Journal of Human Genetics (via PubMed Central), 1980
  22. 22.The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1978 - Award ceremony speech (Peter Reichard) · NobelPrize.org, 1978
  23. 23.Richard J. Roberts - Facts · NobelPrize.org (Nobel Prize Outreach)
  24. 24.Historical Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U): U.S. city average, all items (December 2024 edition) · US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2025
  25. 25.Farm income and production impacts from the use of genetically modified (GM) crop technology 1996-2020 (Brookes G), GM Crops & Food 13(1) · Taylor & Francis (via PubMed Central), 2022
  26. 26.Three Biotechnology Scientists Awarded 2013 World Food Prize · The World Food Prize Foundation, 2013

Fact-checked on September 24, 2026 by a separate AI fact-checking pass that re-opened the sources, with 7 corrections made. How we check

Suggest a correction