6 I DOING SCIENCE ^ 129 



scientists rejected vitalism (see description below), it seemed that the egg 

 must hold all the material necessary for development. Or at least everything 

 necessary to respond appropriately to external influences that direct devel- 

 opment. Because development must be some combination of epigenetic 

 response and inherited action (or else evolution could not work), something 

 about the egg must be inherited and organized in some way. Either the egg 

 cytoplasm or the nucleus was important — or both. 



That is what the MBL researchers argued in the 1890s and for the next 

 century: that both heredity and environment play essential roles in directing 

 development. Conklin and Watase reminded those who claimed priority for 

 the nucleus that the mitotic apparatus, necessary for the cell to divide, 

 actually resides in the cytoplasm and directs the cells' cleavage patterns. The 

 nucleus cannot survive, divide, or do anything interesting by itself. Even 

 modern biologists might do well to recall that Wilson's great ctyological 

 work and his classic The Cell in Development and Inheritance (1896, 1900, 

 1925) stressed a balanced view of the nucleus and cytoplasm that was 

 characteristic of the MBL. Geneticists began to draw attention exclusively to 

 the nucleus, so that some forgot about the cytoplasm (though Morgan never 

 did). Others, especially the embiyologists, became so distracted by the chase 

 of elusive chemical "organizers " (or substances thought to direct develop- 

 ment by organizing the material in the proper way) that they ignored the 

 nucleus and heredity. Yet other prominent MBL scientists such as Conklin 

 continually stressed that they remained friends of the cell — the whole cell, 

 and the whole egg, and the whole developing organism. Recent work in 

 developmental biology, some of the best done at the MBL or by MBL alumni, 

 has returned attention to that lesson: do not forget the C34oplasm in the rush 

 to identify inherited bits of material in the nucleus. 



Also it is important to pursue both zoology and botany, the MBL has 

 insisted with varying results. From the beginning, the idea to include both 

 carried the day. After all, the trustees wanted to establish a marine biological 

 laboratory. Yet those very first years were really dominated by basic devel- 

 opment of animals and by invertebrate studies. Despite the trustees' inten- 

 tions and Whitman's agreement, it took a while before botany really became 

 established, and it has never gained the status that zoology enjoyed. Indeed, 

 the botanist who had declared that the Johns Hopkins University program 

 in biology contained "plenty of lobster, but hardly enough vegetables to 

 make a decent salad" might well have leveled the same criticism at the MBL. 

 A botany course existed for many years, until the loss of its energetic 

 director brought its demise. The head of the supply department, George 

 Gray, made collections of the organisms attached to the buoys near Woods 

 Hole (especially plants) over several years. As there is no lack of interest 

 among students, such a course may well be revived in the future to help gain 

 the balance tliat the founders said they wanted. A short course on the cell 



