one gene–one enzyme hypothesis

one gene–one enzyme hypothesis, idea advanced in the early 1940s that each gene controls the synthesis or activity of a single enzyme. The concept, which united the fields of genetics and biochemistry, was proposed by American geneticist George Wells Beadle and American biochemist Edward L. Tatum, who conducted their studies in the mold Neurospora crassa. Their experiments involved first exposing the mold to mutation-inducing X-rays and then culturing it in a minimal growth medium that contained only the basic nutrients that the wild-type, or nonmutated, strain of mold needed to survive. They found that the mutant strains of mold required the addition of specific amino acids to the minimal medium in order to grow. Using this information, the researchers were able to associate mutations in specific genes to the disruption of individual enzymes in the metabolic pathways that normally produced the missing amino acids. This discovery won Beadle and Tatum the 1958 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine (shared with American geneticist Joshua Lederberg).

Although the hypothesis was amply verified in principle, it has undergone considerable sophistication since the 1940s. Today it is known that not all genes encode an enzyme and that some enzymes are made up of several short polypeptides encoded by two or more genes.