Thread by @c0nc0rdance

It's the last day of #BlackHistoryMonth, let's talk about Ernest Everett Just.

Just's story weaves together good, rigorous science with racism & tragedy.

He was born in 1883 in seaside Charleston, South Carolina.

By age 4, his father & grandfather had died, leaving his teacher mother to raise him & 4 siblings.

At a young age, he was sick w typhoid for 6 weeks. Afterwards, because of resulting brain damage, he had to re-learn how to read & write.

At 16, his mother sent him to a 4 yr prep school in New Hampshire, then she died the following year. He finished in 3 years with the highest grades in the class.

He went on to graduate the top of his class at Dartmouth in 1907, but because he was the only Black person graduating, was asked not to give the valedictory speech because of "community sensitivity".

He applied to faculty positions, but as a Black person, most university positions in the US were barred to him by law or practice. In 1907 He took a position at HBU Howard University teaching English & later Biology.

He rose quickly to be head of the Dept of Zoology.

During this time, he began his research on animal reproduction, using marine invertebrates as his research model. In 1909 Univ of Chicago's Frank R. Lillie invited Just to be his research assistant at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass.

Lillie was able to get him admitted to the PhD program at University of Chicago, and in 1916 he became the first Black person to receive a PhD from there.

His thesis was on the cell biology of fertilization, and this is a good time to talk about his discoveries:

The problem of sexual reproduction is that there are usually more sperm than needed.

One egg only needs one sperm, but there are usually millions & if more than one enters the egg (called polyspermy), the competing genetic payloads cause defects that are usually fatal.

The egg has to be gatekeeper: one sperm, then shut the gate. This is called "block to polyspermy", a series of changes that occur in the egg.

Researchers had noticed that w salty enough water, eggs could be be induced to block without a sperm entering, (~parthenogenesis).

Just discovered was that there were two distinct processes: a fast block & a slow block.

The fast block to polyspermy is triggered by electrical potential across a membrane: only the 1st sperm would be immune from reversal of charge. Like turning a magnetic pole from + to -.

The second mechanism was slower & controlled by organelles just below the surface of the egg, called the "ectoplasm" by Just.

Upon entry of the 1st sperm, vesicles (sacks) filled with proteins dump their contents into a space between the egg & the perivitelline space.

Just was the first to make these discoveries because he adopted ecological approaches: he ran experiments in conditions that matched the natural environment of his animal models, was fastidious in every detail & spent long hours observing the animals in their natural habitats.

In his career, Just published 70 articles, wrote two solo textbooks on cell biology, collaborated on three more with luminaries like TH Morgan... but in spite of his international recognition as a top flight scientist, he couldn't get a faculty position in the US.

In 1929, frustrated by racial limits, he began working in Europe.

First, Naples at the Anton Dohrn Institute, then Berlin at the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institute; then after Paris & the marine laboratory at Roscoff. He thrived in Europe but still faced racism from Americans abroad.

In 1939 he was warned to leave France, but couldn't abandon his work.

In 1940, the Nazi army arrested him & sent him to a prison camp. His German-born wife's father was able to have him released. He returned to the US where he died of pancreatic cancer only a year later.

His story can serve to remind us what was lost to the world when human potential is limited by bigotry & hate.

In the words of his biographer, Kenneth Manning, he was a "Black Apollo of Science".

A brilliant scientist limited by the time into which he was born.