Development of molecular biology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison

Dramatic changes in the foundation of academic departments in our universities are uncommon. With the demonstration that DNA was the cellular source of genetic information, and that this information could be regulated, the field of molecular biology was born. Later, when scientists found that they could tinker with this information, the field matured. In an unusually rapid manner, molecular biology was integrated into the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in the late 1950s and early 1960s. This present article is a chronology of how it happened. What are the factors that made this transition possible in the University of Wisconsin? What lessons have we learned from this experience?