Later, they, and Mary-Dell Chilton and her research team at the University of Washington, demonstrated that a segment of this plasmid, the T-DNA, is copied and transferred into the genome of the infected plant cell. They were the first to discover, in 1974, that Agrobacterium tumefaciens, the plant tumor-inducing soil microbe, carries a rather large circular molecule of DNA, which they named 'Ti plasmid.' They demonstrated that this plasmid is responsible for formation of the plant tumor. In the late 1960s, Van Montagu and his fellow researcher Jeff Schell (1935-2003) started working with the plant disease known as crown gall. This led to a permanent position with the Cell Biology Department at Ghent University Medical School, where he focused his research on RNA bacteriophages with his colleague Walter Fiers. in organic chemistry/biochemistry in 1965. Van Montagu’s path of study and scientific experimentation culminated in a Ph.D. Later, as a student at Ghent University, he became intrigued with the new science of molecular biology, particularly the functions of DNA and RNA, which had recently been discovered to be present in all living organisms. His excellent teachers in high school triggered Van Montagu’s enthusiasm for organic chemistry and biology. Despite his family’s economic difficulties throughout the war and post-war period, they were able to send their only child to good primary and secondary schools. Born in 1933 in Ghent, Belgium, Marc Van Montagu grew up during the Second World War, a time when food rationing and general hardships were common among most of that country’s population.

The Prize by Irma Chilton