Jerry Adams

Who is Jerry Adams?

Jerry McKee Adams, FAA, FRS is a molecular biologist whose research into the genetics of haemopoietic differentiation and malignancy, led him and his wife, Professor Suzanne Cory, to be the first two scientists to pioneer gene cloning techniques in Australia, and to successfully clone mammalian genes. Adams currently shares the position of Joint-Head of the Molecular Genetics of Cancer Division at The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne.

Their research, following that by Susumu Tonegawa, also led to the discovery that antibody genes encode as bits and pieces, that can recombine in a myriad of ways to help fight infection; they also confirmed earlier work by Shen-Ong & Cole, Leder, Hood, Croce, and Hayward that genetic mutation leads to Burkitt's lymphoma, a malignancy of antibody-producing cells, called "B lymphocytes".

It was in Adams' lab that his PhD student, David Vaux, made the connection between apoptosis and cancer, while studying bcl-2 gene in follicular lymphoma, the most common human lymphoma.

After completing his PhD, Adams was awarded the Helen Hay Whitney Fellowship to pursue post-doctoral training. He spent a year working under Professor James Watson at the MRCL of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England. He then moved to the Institut de Biologie Moléculaire, at the University of Geneva, where he trained under Professor A. Tissiéres. During this stay in Geneva, he met Suzanne Cory, and started their long-term collaboration. Adams and Cory subsequently moved to Australia, and began working at WEHI where they established the Institute's first molecular genetics laboratory.