Daniel Dykhuizen

Daniel Dykhuizen
Alma materStanford University
University of Chicago
Scientific career
FieldsEvolutionary Biology
InstitutionsPurdue University
Washington University in St. Louis
Stony Brook University

Daniel Edward Dykhuizen (born October 31, 1942) is an American ecologist. He is emeritus professor of Ecology and Evolution at Stony Brook University in New York. His major scientific interest is in evolutionary biology, specifically experimental evolution using bacteria and the population genetics of bacterial pathogens, which is especially relevant to combating infectious diseases. He used experimental evolution to precisely test theories in evolutionary biology.

Education and career

Dykhuizen graduated from Stanford University in 1965 with a BS in mathematics and from the University of Chicago in 1971 with a PhD under Richard Lewontin. He worked with Allen Campbell at Stanford as a postdoctoral fellow, before moving to Canberra, Australia as a research fellow from 1972 to 1976 in the Genetics Department at Australian National University. He returned to the United States as a postdoctoral fellow with Daniel Hartl at Purdue University and then moved with Hartl to Washington University in St. Louis. In 1987 he took a faculty position at Stony Brook University, where he rose from an assistant professor to a distinguished professor before he retired.[1]

Research

Dykhuizen has published over 100 reviewed articles and book chapters with over 10,000 citations.[2] He plans to publish a book with Tony Dean called “Experimental Evolution: the making of a field”, at the end of 2025. He was the editor in chief of the Quarterly Review of Biology from 2010 to 2021.[3]

Examples of Dykhuizen's most notable research accomplishments include using chemostats to study natural selection;[4] testing the energy conservation theory of Lwoff using mutations of the genes used to synthesis tryptophan;[5] showing lateral gene transfer happens between strains of Escherichia coli;[6] estimating that there are millions of species of bacteria;[7] developing the metabolic flux theory of fitness with Tony Dean and Dan Hartl;[8][9] (7) showing selection against wasteful synthesis of proteins depended upon use of process rather than resource;[10] showing that the Eastern Coyote is a mixture of Western Coyote, wolf and dog;[11] and discussing problems in public health.[12]

Awards and Honors

References

  1. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel. "CURRICULUM VITAE DANIEL EDWARD DYKHUIZEN" (PDF). Stony Brook University. Retrieved 7 Aug 2025.
  2. ^ "Daniel E. Dykhuizen". Google Scholar. Retrieved 7 Aug 2025.
  3. ^ The Editors and Staff of The Quarterly Review of Biology. "DR. DANIEL E. DYKHUIZEN PROMOTED TO EDITOR EMERITUS OF THE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF BIOLOGY". The University of Chicago Press Journals.
  4. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel; Hartl, Daniel (1983). "Selection in chemostats". Microbiological Reviews. 47 (2): 150–168. doi:10.1128/mr.47.2.150-168.1983. PMC 281569. PMID 6308409.
  5. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel (1978). "Selection for tryptophan auxotrophs of Escherichia coli in the glucose-limited chemostats as a test of the energy conservation hypothesis of evolution". Evolution. 32 (1): 125–150. doi:10.1111/j.1558-5646.1978.tb01103.x. PMID 28564086.
  6. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel; Green, Louis (1991). "Recombination in Escherichia coli and the definition of biological species". Journal of Bacteriology. 173 (22): 7257–7268. doi:10.1128/jb.173.22.7257-7268.1991. PMC 209233. PMID 1938920.
  7. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel (1998). "Santa Rosalia revisited: why are there so many species of bacteria?". Antonie van Leeuwenhoek Journal of Microbiology. 73 (1): 25–33. doi:10.1023/a:1000665216662. PMID 9602276.
  8. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel; Dean, Anthony M.; Hartl, Daniel (1987). "Metabolic flux and fitness". Genetics. 115 (1): 25–31. doi:10.1093/genetics/115.1.25. PMC 1203059. PMID 3104135.
  9. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel E.; Dean, Antony M. (August 1990). "Enzyme activity and fitness: Evolution in solution". Trends in Ecology & Evolution. 5 (8): 257–262. Bibcode:1990TEcoE...5..257D. doi:10.1016/0169-5347(90)90067-N. PMID 21232368.
  10. ^ Stoebel, Daniel; Dean, Antony M.; Dykhuizen, Daniel (2008). "The cost of expression of Escherichia coli lac operon proteins is in the process, not the products". Genetics. 178 (3): 1653–1660. doi:10.1534/genetics.107.085399. PMC 2278061. PMID 18245823.
  11. ^ Monzón, Javier; Kays, Roland; Dykhuizen, Daniel (2013). "Assessment of coyote-wolf-dog admixture using ancestry-informative diagnostic SNPs". Molecular Ecology. 23 (1): 182–197. doi:10.1111/mec.12570. PMC 3899836. PMID 24148003.
  12. ^ Dykhuizen, Daniel E. (June 2021). "Public Health and Paul De Kruif". The Quarterly Review of Biology. 96 (2): 127–132. doi:10.1086/714488.