Among the Mendelists was the population geneticist, C. C. Li, who had a growing reputation as a teacher and textbook writer. Several Chinese geneticists, whom I saw years later, remembered him and extolled his great skill as a teacher. His widely in.uential book (Li 1948) was beginning to catch on, both inside and outside China.
But life was not good, and he was under great social pressure to conform. His wife, who had lived in the United States, was particularly unhappy. The Li family eventually contrived, despite hardships, to get out of China through Hong Kong. [As a poignant aside, I note that Li’s book was dedicated “to Jeff.” I often wondered who Jeff was. Later I learned (Spiess 1983): Jeffrey was an infant son who died during the hardships of the Li family’s last days in China.]
In the United States, largely through the in.uence of H. J. Muller, Li accepted a position at the University of Pittsburgh, where he has been ever since—a decision neither he nor Pittsburgh has reason to regret. His repu-tation as a teacher continued to grow throughout the world. His book quickly became popular in the United States and went through several editions. He is held in great admiration and affection, and recently celebrated his 90th birthday.
During the period from about 1958 to 1966, the Ly-senkoist and Mendelian views of genetics were permit-ted to coexist. That must have been terribly confusing for students. “Practical” research was permitted, and Tan wrote several papers on the effects of high-energy radiation on the chromosomes of the rhesus monkey.
Tan described an incident from that time, which is revealing and also wryly amusing. An experimenter had treated cotton with a vital dye and reported inherited effects of the treatment in the next generation. Tan was sent to investigate and later discovered that a paper reporting these results had been submitted with his name attached. He adroitly explained, however, that he had tried to learn the techniques but had been unsuc-cessful. Since he had not adequately mastered the tech-niques, he did not deserve to be an author. So his name was removed, and his reputation among Mendelian ge-neticists was thereby preserved.
Then another blow fell. The period 1966–1976 was the time of the Cultural Revolution, “ten long years.” Again, these were hard times, and Tan published almost nothingduringthatperiod.Furthermore,helostalmost all contact with his colleagues abroad. Finally, in 1978 he was able to leave China and attend the 50th anniver-sary of the founding of CalTech’s Biology Division in Pasadena.
At last, in 1979 at the age of 70 when most people are retired, he was able again to do genetic research. Once more, he took up his study of ladybird beetles, .nding more alleles and obtaining more population data. But this was no longer center stage. The molecular revolution had occurred during the eclipse of Chinese genetics,andgeneticswasgoinginnewdirections.Char-acteristically, Tan immediately became the leader. He was active in the search for harmful environmental chemicals, advocating the Ames system for testing possi-ble mutagens and carcinogens. He was alert to molecu-lar techniques and wrote about RNA ampli.cation in heterosis. He wrote a number of essays and review arti-cles on various aspects of genetics and evolution and the changes brought about by technical advances. He was an early advocate of the construction of a human genome library. He directed various studies on rice. He used mitochondrial DNA to study human variability. And much more. In his 70 years of teaching and re-search, despite the long interruptions, he has published more than 100 scienti.c papers—original research, re-views, translations, and essays. His overview of Chinese genetics (Fu et al. 1995) is a concise summary of a long history.
As early as 1952, Tan had moved to Shanghai to be-come Professor and Chairman of the Biology Depart-ment at Fudan University. He has remained there since, holding various high administrative positions. Now re-tired, he is honorary director of the Genetics Institute at that university.
In the 1980s and 90s the world of genetics in China made up for its neglect of Tan. He was showered with richly deserved honors. These are too numerous to list, but I shall mention a few. He was president of the Genet-ics Society of China, the Environmental Mutagens Soci-ety of China, and the Biotechnology Society of China. He was an of.cer, usually vice president, of the Interna-tional Genetics Congress in 1948, 1983, 1988, and 1993. Finally, he was the major proponent and then president of the 18th International Congress, held in Beijing in 1998. Among his foreign honors are a distinguished alumni award from the California Institute of Technol-ogy, foreign membership in the United States National Academy of Sciences, foreign membership in the Japa-nese and British Genetics Societies, and honorary life member of the New York Academy of Sciences. Finally, in 1999 he received a unique honor: a planet was named after him, Planet Number 3542, discovered at an obser-vatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. What other geneticist can claim this?
Tan’s volume, The Selected Works of Tan Jaizhen (Tan 1992), is a trove of interesting items, especially for those who can read Chinese. But pictures are the same in any language, and the book has some 45 pages of them, mostly in color, showing the gregarious Tan at various times of his life, along with almost a Who’s Who of geneti-cists that he met during his travels. The pictures repre-sent two periods, with large gaps caused by Lysenkoism and the Cultural Revolution. The book is composed of a summary and sometimes the entire text of some 80 papers. The majority of the articles are in Chinese, but enough are in English to satisfy the language chal-lenged. Included is a heart-warming tribute to his men-tor, Dobzhansky, whom Tan never saw after 1948. This bookisawonderfulwaytoseethebreadthofhisinterest. Now, well into his nineties, he can look back on a career that has had far higher peaks and deeper valleys than most geneticists can claim. Despite hardships and set-backs, he has had a rich life. He has lived by his intellect and personality, and by his wits, both scienti.cally and politically. The Selected Works of Tan Jaizhen shows the fruits.
I am indebted to Joshua Lederberg and Rayla Temin for reading the manuscript and offering useful suggestions.
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