John Shine (born 3 July 1946) is an Australian biochemist and molecular biologist. Shine and Lynn Dalgarno discovered a nucleotide sequence, called the Shine–Dalgarno sequence, necessary for the initiation of protein synthesis. He directed the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney from 1990 to 2011. From 2018 to 2022, Shine was President of the Australian Academy of Science.
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Background and early career
The brother of scientist Richard Shine, John Shine was born in Brisbane in 1946 and completed his university studies at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra, graduating with a bachelor of science with honours in 1972 and completing his PhD in 1975. During the course of his studies he and his supervisor, Lynn Dalgarno, discovered the RNA sequence necessary for ribosome binding and the initiation of protein synthesis in the bacterium Escherichia coli. The sequence was named the Shine–Dalgarno sequence. This was a key discovery allowing further development of molecular biology, especially genetic engineering, and was an important discovery towards understanding gene expression and regulation.
Shine undertook post doctoral research at the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). During this period he became the first person to clone a human hormone gene and was central to the cloning of the insulin and growth hormone genes. He also determined the first sequence responsible for replication of a cancer-causing virus.
Returning to Australia and ANU in 1978, he cloned the human renin and endorphin genes, going on to show that human hormones expressed in bacteria can maintain their biological activity. He also founded the Centre for Recombinant DNA Research at ANU. In 1982 he was awarded that Gottschalk Medal by the Australian Academy of Science.