GEORGE D. SNELL - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED - HFSID 201743

GEORGE D. SNELL
Snell handwrote and signed this letter listing why he decided to identify histocompatibility genes, the work that won him a shared Noble Prize for Medicine.
Autograph letter signed "G. Snell" in blue ink. 2 pages, 8x10¾ (front and verso), on letterhead of William W. Stanhope, Alburquerque, New Mexico. In full: "During the first few years after The Jackson Laboratory was founded in 1929, Dr. Little, who founded the Laboratory, and most of the original 7 staff members, concentrated on [illegible] the number of histocompat-ibility genes - the genes that determine susceptibility and resistance to tissue transplants. Dr. Little had, as a graduate student, found that such genes existed. Some years after I joined the staff in 1935, I read the accounts of this early work, it seemed to me that it should be both interesting and possible to identify these genes individually. I worked out a method by which this could be done. That was the basis of nearly all my subsequent work." Postscript: a citation of his 1948 article Methods for the Study of Histocompatibility Genes in Genetics. On verso of signature is a typed and signed letter from Stanhope, dated March 31, 1990, to Snell. In part: "What was the one piece of information, or break through, that led you to your discovery that you were awarded the Nobel Prize for and why?" Snell (1903-1996, born in Bradford, Massachusetts) was an American scientist. Snell shared the 1980 Nobel Prize for Medicine with Baruj Benacerraf and Jean Dausset for their discoveries concerning genetically determined structures on the cell surface that regulate immunological reactions. This work focused on histocompatibility, or compatibility between the genetic makeup of a tissue donor and the recipient of that tissue. Snell, working with British geneticist Peter Gorer, identified genes that encode proteins on the surfaces of cells that allow an organism to distinguish its own tissues from foreign organisms. This work helped paved the way for successful tissue and organ transplants and minimize transplant rejections. Lightly toned and creased.Top edge is ragged and torn. Folded twice vertically and thrice horizontally and unfolded. Otherwise in fine condition.