Genomics Pioneer Dies

Monica Riley, who led groundbreaking work studying the E. coli genome, has passed away at age 87.

abby olena
| 1 min read

Register for free to listen to this article
Listen with Speechify
0:00
1:00
Share

MARINE BIOLOGICAL LABORATORYMonica Riley, an emeritus professor and co-founder of the Josephine Bay Paul Center for Comparative Molecular Biology and Evolution at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, worked throughout her career to better understand gene expression and microbial genomes. Last month (October 11), Riley died from heart failure in Richmond, California. She was 87.

According to an MBL obituary, after earning a degree in chemistry from Smith College in 1947, Riley completed a PhD in biochemistry at the University of California, Berkley, in 1960, where she studied gene expression in the lab of Arthur Pardee and collaborated with Francois Jacob and Jacques Monod on work “that contributed to the discovery of mRNA.” A stint as a postdoc at Stanford University led her to faculty appointments at University of California, Davis, followed by the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and finally the MBL, which Riley joined in 1992. Riley maintained her lab there—developing “classification systems for gene products and their functions, pioneering the current gene ontologies . . . and shaping the fields of functional and comparative ...

Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of

The Scientist Logo
Receive full access to more than 35 years of archives, as well as TS Digest, digital editions of The Scientist, feature stories, and much more!
Already a member? Login Here

Keywords

Meet the Author

  • abby olena

    Abby Olena, PhD

    As a freelancer for The Scientist, Abby reports on new developments in life science for the website.
Share
3D illustration of a gold lipid nanoparticle with pink nucleic acid inside of it. Purple and teal spikes stick out from the lipid bilayer representing polyethylene glycol.
February 2025, Issue 1

A Nanoparticle Delivery System for Gene Therapy

A reimagined lipid vehicle for nucleic acids could overcome the limitations of current vectors.

View this Issue
Enhancing Therapeutic Antibody Discovery with Cross-Platform Workflows

Enhancing Therapeutic Antibody Discovery with Cross-Platform Workflows

sartorius logo
Considerations for Cell-Based Assays in Immuno-Oncology Research

Considerations for Cell-Based Assays in Immuno-Oncology Research

Lonza
An illustration of animal and tree silhouettes.

From Water Bears to Grizzly Bears: Unusual Animal Models

Taconic Biosciences
Sex Differences in Neurological Research

Sex Differences in Neurological Research

bit.bio logo

Products

Photo of a researcher overseeing large scale production processes in a laboratory.

Scaling Lentiviral Vector Manufacturing for Optimal Productivity

Thermo Fisher Logo
Collage-style urban graphic of wastewater surveillance and treatment

Putting Pathogens to the Test with Wastewater Surveillance

An illustration of an mRNA molecule in front of a multicolored background.

Generating High-Quality mRNA for In Vivo Delivery with lipid nanoparticles

Thermo Fisher Logo
Tecan Logo

Tecan introduces Veya: bringing digital, scalable automation to labs worldwide