Kary Mullis - Career

Career

After receiving his PhD, Mullis left science to write fiction, but quit and became a biochemist at a medical school in Kansas City. He then managed a bakery for two years. Mullis returned to science at the encouragement of friend Thomas White, who later got Mullis a job with the biotechnology company Cetus Corporation of Emeryville, California. Mullis worked as a DNA chemist at Cetus for seven years; it was there, in 1983, that Mullis invented his prize-winning improvements to the polymerase chain reaction. After leaving Cetus in 1986, Mullis served as director of molecular biology for Xytronyx, Inc. in San Diego for two years. Mullis has consulted on nucleic acid chemistry for multiple corporations.

In 1992, Mullis founded a business with the intent to sell pieces of jewelry containing the amplified DNA of deceased famous people like Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe. Mullis is also a member of the USA Science and Engineering Festival's Advisory Board.

He is a researcher at the Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute in Oakland, California.

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