Daniel Koshland, 87, Editor of Science Magazine
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Daniel Koshland, who died Monday at 87, made fundamental discoveries about enzymes and bacteria and conducted an influential reorganization of the study of biology at the University of California at Berkeley.
As editor for a decade, beginning in 1985, of the nation’s leading scientific journal, Science, he revamped what had been a somewhat musty organ and gave it a more active voice in public policy.
A member of the Manhattan Project during World War II, Koshland worked on isolating the element plutonium in laboratories at the University of Chicago and at Oak Ridge, Tenn. In the 1950s and 1960s, he later held a dual appointment at the Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island and at Rockefeller University. During this time, Koshland did groundbreaking work on the subtle mechanisms by which enzymes catalyze chemical reactions. He described the workings as more like a hand fitting into a glove, with both the enzyme and its substrate changing shape subtly. The previously accepted model compared the reaction to a lock and key.
In 1965, Koshland moved to Berkeley, where his research established that bacteria can have a form of long-term memory. He later led a reorganization of biology at Berkeley that sorted 11 departments with more than 200 faculty members into three new departments reflecting the vast changes in the field due to advances in molecular genetics. Other universities followed Berkeley’s lead in reorganizing. In 1992, the university named a new research building Koshland Hall.
As editor of Science, Koshland introduced special editions and streamlined the peer reviewing system for manuscripts. He became a nationally known voice for science. A gifted writer, he often penned editorials as colloquies with a certain “Dr. Noitall,” the “inventor of the chain letter and insider trading” who inevitably represented anti-science’s worst tendencies.
Even while editing Science, he continued to publish his own papers, and in his 80s he undertook the study of bioenergy, using cyanobacteria to produce methane. He was granted two patents for his discoveries in recent years.
