Dave Allis RIP

I have many Dave Allis stories to tell. The one that meant the most to me personally was when he hailed me over between sessions at the national Cell Biology meeting in San Diego and asked me "Did you get your grant?" I told him I hadn't yet heard. He responded: "Well, you should. I thought it was the best grant on the table." In the event, I did. It was my path to promotion and tenure. Everyone needs a champion at study section, and Dave was my champion at a critical time in my career.

In subsequent years, we co-authored a couple of research papers. He hosted me for a seminar visit when he was at UVa and I hosted him for a seminar visit at SLU. He went on to win the Lasker Prize, the American Nobel. We both were invited speakers at meetings in the US and Europe.

He was funny, gnomish, elfin. He genuinely enjoyed the iconoclastic observation. When his lab first connected yeast GCN5 and histone acetylation, he tracked me down at the lab where I was on sabbatical to tell me before it was published.

There are few people in science who a genuinely feel privileged to have known, and few who I will personally miss when they die. Dave Allis is one of those few.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00346-0?WT.ec_id=NATURE-202302&sap-outbound-id=821588980D3DA46DE0BF0344B66DFBCC19FAE00D&fbclid=IwAR0EYXXH9WDax9fl64pyZDdkOqHvCUeWyutJYL5cKw2UOzZ6k8-d12iJLHE

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