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Ultraviolet photobiology: its early roots and insights into DNA repair
1Auerback Melanoma Laboratory, UCSF Cancer Center, Room N431, Box 0808, University of California at San Francisco, 94143, USA. jcleaver@cc.ucsf.edu
Abstract:
This is the first of a series of commentaries on classic papers on DNA repair that highlight the birth of this discipline. The roots go deep, and in this first commentary, I describe some of the earliest discoveries of the mechanism of absorption of UV light in cells, and its lethal and mutagenic effects. Most remarkably, a discovery of DNA repair by the use of split doses of UV light was reported in 1919. Later commentaries will take us sequentially through the early years of DNA repair.
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