David Baulcombe

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British plant scientist and geneticist

title: "David Baulcombe" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["living-people", "1952-births", "british-geneticists", "british-botanists", "scientists-from-norwich", "knights-bachelor", "royal-medal-winners", "fellows-of-trinity-college,-cambridge", "foreign-associates-of-the-national-academy-of-sciences", "academics-of-the-university-of-east-anglia", "recipients-of-the-albert-lasker-award-for-basic-medical-research", "wolf-prize-in-agriculture-laureates", "alumni-of-the-university-of-edinburgh", "alumni-of-the-university-of-leeds", "fellows-of-the-academy-of-medical-sciences-(united-kingdom)", "members-of-academia-europaea", "massry-prize-recipients", "regius-professors-of-botany-(cambridge)", "professors-of-botany-(cambridge)", "benjamin-franklin-medal-(franklin-institute)-laureates", "british-fellows-of-the-royal-society"] description: "British plant scientist and geneticist" topic_path: "science/biology" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Baulcombe" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary British plant scientist and geneticist ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox scientist"]

FieldValue
honorific_prefixSir
nameDavid Baulcombe
imageSir David Baulcombe.jpg
honorific_suffix
birth_nameDavid Charles Baulcombe
birth_date
birth_placeSolihull, England
nationalityBritish
field{{Plainlist
* Epigenetics<ref namefrs
* Disease resistance<ref namefrs/
* Gene expression<ref namefrs/
* Gene silencing<ref namefrs/
work_institutions{{Plain list
alma_mater{{Plainlist
doctoral_advisorJohn Ingle
thesis_titleThe Processing and Intracellular Transport of Messenger RNA in a Higher Plant
thesis_urlhttp://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.641386
thesis_year1976
doctoral_students{{Plainlist
* Olivier Voinnet{{cite thesisdegree
* Robert Martienssen{{cite thesisdegree
known_for{{Plainlist
*RNA silencing<!--{{Cite journallast1
prizes{{Plainlist
children1 son, 3 daughters
spouseRose Eden (m. 1976)
website{{Plainlist
::

| honorific_prefix = Sir | name = David Baulcombe | image = Sir David Baulcombe.jpg | honorific_suffix = | birth_name = David Charles Baulcombe |caption = |birth_date = |birth_place = Solihull, England |death_date = |death_place = |citizenship = |nationality = British |ethnicity = |field ={{Plainlist|

Sir David Charles Baulcombe (born 7 April 1952 He held the Regius botany chair in that department from 2007 to 2020..

Early life and education

David Baulcombe was born on 7 April 1952 in the United Kingdom, in Solihull, Warwickshire,

As a child growing up in England’s West Midlands, David Baulcombe developed a fascination for algae, mosses, and other ‘lower plants’, which eventually led him to study botany at Leeds before shifting his focus to molecular biology.

He received his Bachelor of Science degree in botany from the University of Leeds in 1973, and continued his studies at the University of Edinburgh, receiving his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1976/1977 (for research on Messenger RNA in vascular plants supervised by John Ingle).

Career

After his doctoral research, Baulcombe spent the next three years as a postdoctoral fellow in North America, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and then in Athens, Georgia, in the United States (respectively, at McGill University from January 1977-November 1978, and then the University of Georgia thereafter, until December 1980). Baulcombe returned to the United Kingdom then, where he was given the opportunity to create his own research group at the Plant Breeding Institute in Cambridge (PBI, the John Innes Centre). At the PBI, Baulcombe initially held the position of Higher Scientific Officer, and was promoted to Principal Scientific Officer in April 1986.

In August 1988 Baulcombe left Cambridge for Norwich. He joined the Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich in 1988, and as of 2007 was a senior research scientist, Accordingly, in 2008, Baulcombe was also named as a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. In 2009, the Cambridge professorship was renamed "Regius Professor of Botany". He was succeeded in the chair by Ottoline Leyser in 2020.

Baulcombe "serves on several [professional] committees and study sections",

Research

An annotation regarding Baulcombe's 2001 nomination to The Royal Society read that he hadmade an outstanding contribution to the inter-related areas of plant virology, gene silencing and disease resistance... discover[ing] a specific signalling system and an antiviral defence system in plants... [leading] to the development of new technologies that promise to revolutionise gene discovery in plant biology. Hence, his research interests have mainly been in botany and fundamental biology, in the fields of virus movement, genetic regulation, disease resistance, and RNA and more generally, gene silencing.

In 1998 Craig Mello, Andrew Fire, and colleagues reported a potent gene silencing effect—observations on the mechanism of RNA interference—after injecting double stranded RNA into Caenorhabditis elegans, a discovery notable as a detailed description of what proved to be the correct mechanism of a broad class of phenomena. Baulcombe then, with Andrew Hamilton, discovered a small interfering RNA that is the specificity determinant in RNA-mediated gene silencing in plants. Baulcombe's group demonstrated "that while viruses can induce gene silencing some viruses encode proteins that suppress gene silencing". although some have argued that Baulcombe was among those overlooked for that year's prize.)

With other members of his research group at the Sainsbury Laboratory, Baulcombe also helped unravel the importance of small interfering RNA in epigenetics and in defence against viruses.

Honours and awards

In June 2009, Baulcombe was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in the 2009 Birthday Honours List, "for services to plant science".

Baulcombe has also received the following honours and awards:

Personal life

Baulcombe stated in a post dated 2017 that outside of the laboratory, he "promote[s] the use of plant biotechnology for crop improvement... [and that he is] particularly interested in technologies addressing problems in developing countries." He has said he works on plants "because their products are good to eat and wear and write on - and also because plants are often good models for general biology.

As of mid-2024 Baulcombe resided in Norwich. He has been married to Rose Eden since 1976, and they have four children. His interests include music, sailing, and hill walking.

References

References

  1. Staff of the Royal Society & Baulcombe, David. (7 October 2024). "Fellows Directory: Professor Sir David Baulcombe FMedSci FRS". [[The Royal Society]].
  2. Voinnet, Olivier. (2001). "Molecular analysis of post-transcriptional gene silencing : mechanisms and roles". University of East Anglia.
  3. Martienssen, Robert A.. (1986). "The molecular genetics of alpha-amylase gene families in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.)". University of Cambridge.
  4. (2004). "RNA silencing in plants". Nature.
  5. University of Cambridge Staff & Baulcombe, David. (7 October 2024). "Head of Group: Sir David Baulcombe". [[University of Cambridge]].
  6. "David Baulcombe {{!}} Gruber Foundation".
  7. Baulcombe, David. (October 2024). "The Processing and Intracellular Transport of Messenger RNA in a Higher Plant". University of Edinburgh.
  8. . ["David Baulcome Thesis"](https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/14914).
  9. University of Cambridge Staff. (September 2009}} In March 2007 it was announced that Baulcombe would become the next [[Professor of Botany, Cambridge University). "News and Events - Current News". [[University of Cambridge]], Department of Plant Sciences.
  10. (2009-11-24). "A new Regius Professor for the University".
  11. (14 May 2020). "Professor Ottoline Leyser DBE FRS elected as Regius Professor of Botany". www.globalfood.cam.ac.uk.
  12. APS Staff & Baulcombe, David Charles. (2003). "Ruth Allen Award [2002 awardee biography]". [[American Phytopathological Society]] (APS).
  13. . ["David Baulcome"](https://www.infosysprize.org/jury/2015/david-baulcombe.html).
  14. EMBO Journal Staff & Baulcombe, David. (January 2009). "Editorial Team" Senior Advisors - David C. Baulcombe". [[EMBO Press]].
  15. WebCitation.org Staff, and Anon.. (2014). ["Archive item details: Repository—GB 117 The Royal Society"](http://royalsociety.org/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=show.tcl&dsqSearch=(RefNo==%27EC%2F2001%2F03%27).
  16. (2004). "RNA silencing in plants". Nature.
  17. (2002). "Two classes of short interfering RNA in RNA silencing". The EMBO Journal.
  18. (2001). "Replicating potato spindle tuber viroid RNA is accompanied by short RNA fragments that are characteristic of post-transcriptional gene silencing". Nucleic Acids Research.
  19. (2000). "An RNA-dependent RNA polymerase gene in Arabidopsis is required for posttranscriptional gene silencing mediated by a transgene but not by a virus". Cell.
  20. (2000). "Virus-induced silencing of a plant cellulose synthase gene". The Plant Cell.
  21. (2000). "Potato virus X amplicons in arabidopsis mediate genetic and epigenetic gene silencing". The Plant Cell.
  22. (1999). "RNA-DNA interactions and DNA methylation in post-transcriptional gene silencing". The Plant Cell.
  23. (1987). "The complete nucleotide sequence of tobacco rattle virus RNA-1". The Journal of General Virology.
  24. (1986). "The organisation and interviral homologies of genes at the 3' end of tobacco rattle virus RNA1". The EMBO Journal.
  25. (2012). "Maternal siRNAs as regulators of parental genome imbalance and gene expression in endosperm of Arabidopsis seeds". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
  26. (1986). "Expression of biologically active viral satellite RNA from the nuclear genome of transformed plants". Nature.
  27. (2004). "Modulation of floral development by a gibberellin-regulated microRNA". Development.
  28. (1998). "Potent and specific genetic interference by double-stranded RNA in Caenorhabditis elegans". Nature.
  29. (1999). "A Species of Small Antisense RNA in Posttranscriptional Gene Silencing in Plants". Science.
  30. Daneholt, Bertil. (October 2024}} After these initial observations, many laboratories around the world searched for the occurrence of this phenomenon in other organisms.{{fact). "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2006: Advanced Information - RNA interference". The Nobel Foundation.
  31. Westly, Erica. (October 6, 2008). "No Nobel for You: Top 10 Nobel Snubs". Springer Nature.
  32. From the Central Chancery of the Orders of Knighthoods, St. James’s Palace, London, recorded in ''The Gazette (London Gazette)'', issue 59090, 13 June 2009, see [https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/59090/supplement/1 Supplement 1, p. 1.]<!--This citation is presented to comply in large part with the form requested by The Gazette, see https://www.thegazette.co.uk/data, and replaces this markup, which does not present as The Gazette requests: {{London Gazette. (13 June 2009)
  33. EMBO Staff & Baulcombe, David. (2017). "Details: EMBO Member David Baulcombe". People.EMBO.org.
  34. AE Staff & Baulcombe, David. (2024). "Members of the Academy of Europe: David Baulcombe". [[Academia Europaea]] (AE).
  35. Wiley Foundation Staff. (2003). "The Wiley Prize in Biomedical Sciences: Our Award Recipients—2003". Wiley Foundation, [[John Wiley & Sons]].
  36. Staff of the Royal Society. (2006). "Medals and Awards: Royal Medals". [[The Royal Society]].
  37. Staff of The Franklin Institute. (2024). "The Franklin Institute Awards: David Baulcombe [Benjamin Franklin Medal]". [[The Franklin Institute]].
  38. Green, Pamela. (April 2011). "2008 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Life Science is Presented to...". [[Elsevier]].
  39. . ["Tiny RNAs that Regulate Gene Function"](https://laskerfoundation.org/winners/tiny-rnas-that-regulate-gene-function/).
  40. Staff of the Royal Society. (7 October 2024). "Awards: Humphry Davy and Claude Bernard Lectures". [[The Royal Society]].
  41. "David Baulcombe International Balzan Prize Foundation".
  42. "Epigenetics researcher a 2012 Balzan prizewinner | Laboratory Product News".
  43. "2014 Gruber Genetics Prize Press Release {{!}} The Gruber Foundation".
  44. MGC Staff. (2024). "McClintock Prize Past Winners—2014: David C. Baulcombe (University of Cambridge)". Maize Genetics Cooperation (MGC).
  45. . ["David Baulcombe"](https://rse.org.uk/fellowship/fellow/professor-sir-david-baulcombe-10332).
  46. PAS Staff & Baulcombe, David. (7 October 2024). "Ordinary Academicians: Prof. David Baulcombe". The [[Pontifical Academy of Sciences]] (PAS).
  47. "List of all Honorary Graduates and Chancellor's Medallists".
  48. . ["Our Team"](https://www.norwichchambermusic.org.uk/about/our-team/).
  49. Staff of Who's Who & Baulcombe, David Charles. (2014). "Baulcombe, Prof. Sir David (Charles)". [[Oxford University Press.
  50. Bailcombe, David. (September 2009). "David Baulcombe—Curriculum Vitae". [[University of Cambridge]].

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