TY - BOOK ID - 29272123 TI - The tangled field : Barbara McClintock's search for the patterns of genetic control PY - 2001 SN - 0674011082 0674004566 PB - Cambridge Harvard University Press DB - UniCat KW - Women geneticists KW - Pure sciences. Natural sciences (general) KW - Genetics KW - Sociology of occupations KW - McClintock, Barbara KW - Geneticists KW - Women biologists KW - McClintock, Barbara, KW - Academic sector KW - Exact sciences KW - Biography KW - Book UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:29272123 AB - This biographical study illuminates one of the most important yet misunderstood figures in the history of science. Barbara McClintock (1902-1992), a geneticist who integrated classical genetics with microscopic observations of the behaviour of chromosomes, was regarded as a genius and as an unorthodox, nearly incomprehensible thinker. In 1946, she discovered mobile genetic elements, which she called "controlling elements." Thirty-seven years later, she won a Nobel Prize for this work, becoming the third woman to receive an unshared Nobel in science. Since then, McClintock has become an emblem of feminine scientific thinking and the tragedy of narrow-mindedness and bias in science. Using McClintock's research notes, available correspondence, and dozens of interviews with McClintock and others, Comfort argues that, contrary to various accounts, including Keller's, McClintock's work was neither ignored in the 1950s nor wholly accepted two decades later. Nor was McClintock marginalized by scientists; throughout the decades of her alleged rejection, she remained a distinguished figure in her field. This biographical study illuminates one of the most important yet misunderstood figures in the history of science. Barbara McClintock, a geneticist who integrated classical genetics with microscopic observations of the behaviour of chromosomes, was regarded as a genius and an unorthodox thinker. ER -