Seymour Benzer (1921–2007)

The style of scientific giants differs at least as much as their interests. Seymour Benzer, who died in Pasadena on Novem-ber 30, 2007, at the age of 86, was made of the stuff of the great restless explorers. But unlike the Cooks and Magellans, he never waited for a monarch's approval to sail, nor did he claim sovereignty over the new territory. With admirable drive, curiosity , and tenacity, he set out again and again on expeditions to unearth hidden treasures of knowledge. Having set foot on terra incognita, he would graciously allow his students to explore it further, without breathing down their necks or asking them to share the glory. In his marvelously idiosyncratic style, he revolutionized the science he touched: molecular biology first, neurogenetics later. Seymour Benzer was born in 1921 in New York City's South Bronx neighborhood , to Jewish parents who immigrated from Poland about 10 years earlier. He once suggested that ''Benzer'' is a metamorphosis of ''Ben Zoma,'' the name of a 2nd century Torah scholar who unfortunately published little and therefore didn't get tenure as a formal rabbi. The Mishna (a postbiblical codification of laws) says that ''whoever sees Ben Zoma in his dream should expect wisdom.'' ''Seymour'' was a forename common among Jewish immigrants from the Old World who aspired to integrate into the new society; the Hebrew equivalent is Shlomo (Solomon). Hence at least the etiology of his names held some promise for the newborn. Despite the economic depression, Seymour grew up in a modest, hardworking but comfortable and protective milieu. He was the first person in his family to attend college. Years later, Benzer would recount dissecting frogs and setting up his first lab in the basement of his home. The centerpiece of the lab was a microscope that he got as Bar-Mitzvah present from his brother-in-law. But his attention was shifted by an influential high-school teacher from biology to chemistry, and then to physics. After graduating from Brooklyn College, and shortly after Pearl Harbor, Benzer enrolled as a graduate student in the Physics Department of Purdue University. He was drafted but was shortly after-ward deferred and recruited into the war effort in the Physics Department, working on a top-secret project to develop semiconductors suitable for use in radar. Two years after the war ended, in 1947, Benzer got his Ph.D. in physics, but his lingering interests in biology diverted him …