Papers of geneticist Suzanne Bourgeois, containing a selection of her lab notebooks and binders, correspondence, and historical research on the founding of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.
Suzanne Bourgeois Papers, 1949-2019 (MSS 845)
Extent: 12.4 Linear feet (31 archives boxes)
Suzanne Bourgeois was a micro-biologist and geneticist who researched the regulation of gene expression and authored a book on the founding of the Salk Institute, Genesis of the Salk Institute (UC Press, 2013). She began her research career in the 1950s at the University of Paris/Sorbonne and the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France under the supervision of Jacques Monod. In 1963 she moved her lab to La Jolla along with her husband Melvin Cohn, another scientist at the Institute Pasteur and Founding Fellow of the Salk Institute. After a 40-year research career, Bourgeois transitioned to public presentations on the state of cancer research and the history of the Salk Institute.
For more information, see Bourgeois' Salk Institute faculty profile and bibliography at https://www.salk.edu/scientist/suzanne-bourgeois/.
The collection documents the professional work of Bourgeois and her lab staff in genetic research, along with her correspondence and historical research into the early Salk Institute. Much of her laboratory work at Pasteur and Salk was stored in binders containing data, charts, illustrations, notes on discussions and lectures, and lists of chemicals. The collection also contains original documents pertaining to the early years of the Salk Institute, such as reports, newsletters, memos, committee minutes, and seminar notes from the 1960s and 1970s that had been stored in various filing cabinets around the Salk campus and compiled by Bourgeois for her book. A small selection of material in this collection consists of material reproduced for Bourgeois from the Archives of the Institute Pasteur, from the fonds Cohn and fonds Monod.
Arranged in eight series: 1) MISCELLANEOUS; 2) SALK INSTITUTE RECORDS; 3) RESEARCH CONDUCTED AT THE PASTEUR INSTITUTE; 4) RESEARCH CONDUCTED AT THE SALK INSTITUTE; 5) WRITINGS AND TALKS; 6) GENESIS OF THE SALK INSTITUTE; 7) CORRESPONDENCE; 8) MEL COHN MATERIALS.