Heredity under the Microscope: Chromosomes and the Study of the Human Genome

By focusing on chromosomes, Heredity under the Microscope offers a new history of postwar human genetics. Today chromosomes are understood as macromolecular assemblies and are analyzed with a variety of molecular techniques. Yet for much of the twentieth century, researchers studied chromosomes by looking down a microscope. Chromosome analysis offered a direct glimpse of the complete genome, opening up seemingly endless possibilities for observation and intervention. Critics, however, countered that visual evidence was not enough and pointed to the need to understand the molecular mechanisms. In telling this history in full for the first time, Soraya de Chadarevian argues that the often-bewildering variety of observations made under the microscope were central to the study of human genetics. By making space for microscope-based practices alongside molecular approaches, and by exploring the close connections between genetics and an array of scientific, medical, ethical, legal and policy concerns in the atomic age, Heredity under the Microscope sheds new light on the cultural history of the human genome.