Albert Levan (8 March 1905,

Gothenburg Gothenburg ( ; ) is the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, second-largest city in Sweden, after the capital Stockholm, and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated by the Kattegat on the west coast of Sweden, it is the gub ...

– 28 March 1998,

Lund Lund (, ;"Lund"
(US) and ) is a city in the provinces of Sweden, province of Scania, southern Swed ...

) was a Swedish

botanist Botany, also called plant science, is the branch of natural science and biology studying plants, especially Plant anatomy, their anatomy, Plant taxonomy, taxonomy, and Plant ecology, ecology. A botanist or plant scientist is a scientist who s ...

and

geneticist A geneticist is a biologist or physician who studies genetics, the science of genes, heredity, and variation of organisms. A geneticist can be employed as a scientist or a lecturer. Geneticists may perform general research on genetic process ...

Life

Albert Levan was born in Gothenburg in 1905, son of Emil Levan and Amy Gabrielsson. He was educated at the

University of Lund Lund University () is a public research university in Sweden and one of Northern Europe's oldest universities. The university is located in the city of Lund in the Swedish province of Scania. The university was officially founded in 1666 on the ...

, where he received his doctorate in 1935, and became professor of cytology in the same university in 1961. He married Karin Malmberg, a pianist, and was the father of illustrator Cecilia Torudd and Göran Levan, professor of genetics at the University of Gothenburg. He died in Lund in 1998.

Research

Albert Levan is best known today for co-authoring the report in 1956 that humans had 46

chromosome A chromosome is a package of DNA containing part or all of the genetic material of an organism. In most chromosomes, the very long thin DNA fibers are coated with nucleosome-forming packaging proteins; in eukaryotic cells, the most import ...

s (instead of 48, as previously believed). This epochal discovery was made by Joe Hin Tjio in Levan's laboratory. Originally specialising in plant

cytology Cell biology (also cellular biology or cytology) is a branch of biology that studies the structure, function, and behavior of cells. All living organisms are made of cells. A cell is the basic unit of life that is responsible for the living an ...

, Levan later turned to the similarities in the chromosome structure of cancer cells and errors introduced to plant cells via chemical or radioactive elements. These studies later led to examination of chromosomes in animal cells. In 1953, a mistake involving mixing

HeLa cells HeLa () is an immortalized cell line used in scientific research. It is the oldest human cell line and one of the most commonly used. HeLa cells are durable and prolific, allowing for extensive applications in scientific study. The line is ...

with the wrong liquid led Joe Hin Tjio and Albert Levan to develop better techniques for staining and counting chromosomes. It allowed researchers for the first time to see and count each chromosome clearly in the HeLa cells with which they were working. They were the first to show that humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes rather than 24, as was previously believed. This was important for the study of developmental disorders, such as Down syndrome, that involve the number of chromosomes.

Honours

Levan was elected a member of the

Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters The Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters (, , ) is a Finnish learned society for natural sciences, social sciences and humanities. It is a bilingual (Swedish and Finnish) science academy and the oldest of the four science academies in Finland. ...

in 1961, and of the

Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences () is one of the Swedish Royal Academies, royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special responsibility for promoting nat ...

in 1967.

References

1905 births 1998 deaths Swedish geneticists Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences 20th-century Swedish botanists Scientists from Gothenburg {{Sweden-botanist-stub