History of Recombinant DNA: Paul Berg & Janet Mertz (Video)

Life Recombined

The Story of Recombinant DNA featuring Janet Mertz and Nobel Laureate Paul Berg

About the Film

In the early 1970s, a period of social, political, and technological upheaval, biology stood on the brink of a revolution that would permanently reshape humanity’s relationship with the natural world. At Stanford University, graduate student Janet Mertz and her mentor, future Nobel Laureate Paul Berg, were asking a radical question: could DNA, the code of life, be manipulated by recombining it in ways billions of years of evolution never had?

When their experiments triggered alarm bells within the scientific community and beyond, they chose to pause their work. Meanwhile, other researchers moved forward, efforts that helped launch today’s multi-trillion-dollar biotechnology industry. LIFE RECOMBINED tells the story of this pivotal moment in science and history, and explores the questions it raised about responsibility, who gets to decide, and how we confront the limits of knowledge.

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Yi D. and Mertz J.E. Paul Berg and the origins of recombinant DNA. Cell 2024 187 (5) 1019–1023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2024.01.007. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867424000096

Berg P. and Mertz J.E. Personal reflections on the origins and emergence of recombinant DNA technology. Genetics January 2010 184 (1) 9–17. https://doi.org/10.1534/genetics.109.112144

What is biotechnology? Recombinant DNA. WhatIsBiotechnology.org. https://www.whatisbiotechnology.org/index.php/science/summary/rdna/genetic-engineering-is-key-to-drug-discovery-and-production

What is biotechnology? Professor Janet Mertz. WhatIsBiotechnology.org. https://www.whatisbiotechnology.org/index.php/people/summary/mertz

Oral history interview with Paul Berg. Stanford Historical Society. https://historicalsociety.stanford.edu/paul-berg

Human Nature. Science Communication Lab. https://sciencecommunicationlab.org/science-documentaries/crispr/

In Memory of Paul Berg
1926-2023

Director:
Regina Sobel

Producers:
Meredith DeSalazar
Sarah Goodwin
Regina Sobel

Cinematographer:
Derek Reich

Editor:
Lee Rossoff

Original Music:
Marcus Bagala

Graphics:
Chris George
Maggie Hubbard

Sound Mixer:
Andrew Oedel

Interviews by:
Adam Bolt

Narrator:
Sarah Goodwin

Senior Producers:
Shannon Behrman
Regina Sobel

Consulting Producer:
Cidney Hue

Executive Producers:
Sarah Goodwin
Elliot Kirschner

Clearance Counsel:
Donaldson Callif Perez
Chris Perez
Eric Fram

Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
© 2007-2026 Science Communication Lab™. All rights reserved.

Janet Mertz

Janet Mertz

Professor Emeritus, University of Wisconsin–Madison

Paul Berg

Paul Berg

Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Professor Emeritus, Stanford University