George E. Fox
Encyclopedia
George Edward Fox is a researcher at the University of Houston
University of Houston
The University of Houston is a state research university, and is the flagship institution of the University of Houston System. Founded in 1927, it is Texas's third-largest university with nearly 40,000 students. Its campus spans 667 acres in southeast Houston, and was known as University of...

 and, with Carl Woese
Carl Woese
Carl Richard Woese is an American microbiologist and physicist. Woese is famous for defining the Archaea in 1977 by phylogenetic taxonomy of 16S ribosomal RNA, a technique pioneered by Woese and which is now standard practice. He was also the originator of the RNA world hypothesis in 1977,...

 in the early 1970s, was the first scientist to classify Archaea
Archaea
The Archaea are a group of single-celled microorganisms. A single individual or species from this domain is called an archaeon...

 as a separate domain
Domain (biology)
In biological taxonomy, a domain is the highest taxonomic rank of organisms, higher than a kingdom. According to the three-domain system of Carl Woese, introduced in 1990, the Tree of Life consists of three domains: Archaea, Bacteria and Eukarya...

 of life within the three-domain system
Three-domain system
The three-domain system is a biological classification introduced by Carl Woese in 1977 that divides cellular life forms into archaea, bacteria, and eukaryote domains. In particular, it emphasizes the separation of prokaryotes into two groups, originally called Eubacteria and Archaebacteria...

. Fox and Woese also introduced the idea of a progenote as a primordial entity in the evolution of life. While with Woese, he pioneered use of comparative analysis in prediction of RNA secondary structure. Using comparative analysis, he also recognized the limitations that RNA sequences could provide when identifying closely related species. His research centers around understanding the early evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...

 of life. Fox contends that one of the earliest components of the genetic machinery to appear in a form bearing resemblance to its modern equivalent was the ribosome
Ribosome
A ribosome is a component of cells that assembles the twenty specific amino acid molecules to form the particular protein molecule determined by the nucleotide sequence of an RNA molecule....

. His research is actively involved in the search for biosignatures on Mars
Life on Mars
Scientists have long speculated about the possibility of life on Mars owing to the planet's proximity and similarity to Earth. Fictional Martians have been a recurring feature of popular entertainment of the 20th and 21st centuries, but it remains an open question whether life currently exists on...

.

Fox received his Bachelor of Arts from Syracuse University
Syracuse University
Syracuse University is a private research university located in Syracuse, New York, United States. Its roots can be traced back to Genesee Wesleyan Seminary, founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1832, which also later founded Genesee College...

in 1967, and completed his Ph.D. at Syracuse University in 1974. Both degrees were in chemical engineering. From 1973-1977, he was a research associate with Carl Woese at the University of Illinois. He became an assistant professor of biochemical & Biophysical Sciences at the University of Houston in 1977; he became a full professor there in 1986.

External links

  • Fox webpage at University of Houston website. Retrieved Oct. 31, 2007.
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