Arthur Riggs, whose work with recombinant DNA led to the development of synthetic insulin, has died from complications of lymphoma. He was 82.
Born in California on August 8, 1939, Riggs spent his childhood in San Bernardino. His father managed a trailer park and his mother, a nurse, bought Arthur his first chemistry set as a child, inspiring a love of science from a young age. “I thoroughly enjoyed mixing reagents and getting changes in color and carbon dioxide release,” Riggs told PNAS for a 2010 profile. “That and reading science fiction got me enthusiastic about science in junior high school.”
Riggs studied biology and chemistry at the University of California, Riverside, and, according to the PNAS profile, particularly enjoyed where those specialties intersected. He married Jane Merrill in 1960 and began graduate school at Caltech in biochemistry the following year.
During graduate school, Riggs met Joel Huberman. When not ...
