Februzry §, 1958

Dr. Barry Coamoner
Shaw School of Botany

Washington University
Ste Louis, dissouri.

Dear Barry:

This will raafflom vur telephone conversation yesterday. We dis—
cussed the qualifications of a number of people in alercbial genctics
whon you night wish & have in your new laboratory dsvelopment. During
that conversation the most likely candidates seemed to be Norton Zinder,
who is now at the hockefelier Institute in New York, and David Nenney,
who iy at Amn Arbor. Eoving slept on the anatter, Iam atill unchle to
make any more promising suggestions then these.

I may have som biographical information on both these man in ay
files ani, if co, «ili send copies along as cnclosives, Zinder wis, as
you know, sy own student, while Nanney «a3 trulned with Sonneborn. Both
men have been cut long enough and hive shoin a sustiined productivity
that opeacs Por thelr independent abilities, Zinder twas been rather
eautious ebout pubiicautions bab ne hes vase swat Interesting work nearly
ready to wrila up on lysogenic oururslon. an abstract on this was
preseitwd ab the National asudumy meting Ja Naw York anl appoared in
Selense during the last few monthy. I think you already have a muasure
of his reputation in Hotchkiss! reaction to your orelimiaary inguiry.
Although ne is cvugianiag to >e properly appreciated In New York, I still
think it would ast be entirely fublle for you to go after hia.

Although he works in a slightly differené field, I think that Nannoy
has @ compurable talent, anil a rather broader background of biological
training. He is thus somewhat lesa kinetically alnied than Zinder. He
is very largely responsible for the revival of tateah;uena as an object
of genetic research. For various reasons, sot all of whish were under
his own control, he has not exploited this organism a3 much as aight be
from the point of view of bliochemicui genstics. This is ona reason why
his projected fellowship at California Institute of Technology would be
useful to him. I hops that that dots not put you off however as I would
think one could always make some reasonable adjustment of tims.
Dr. Barry Commoner
Page 2 - February 4, 1958

I have a very high regard for both -f these men and if I were in
your situation I would consider them very seriously. They certainly
qualify for an appointasnt at the level you indicated. My main con-
cern for either of them would be that you not stress too auch and too
soon the axpected scope of their activities. I think it might be harm
ful for either of them to be suddenly catapulted to a situation where

they had to remove themselves from the laboratory simply in order to
"run" the show.

I don't at all want tc dumeau the capacities of any of the other
people that we discussed. Ail of them have some promise, But I think
that Zinder and iianney clearly stand out in the extent to which they
have alreacy reclized tie pulentialities that were expected of them as
stucents.

Pleise let me kaow Uf IT can be of ung other service.

Yure sincerely,

coshta Lederberg
Professer cf Medical Jens tics

J Le NY

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