Synthetic Lethality

Synthetic lethality is derived from a genetic concept. In 1922, Calvin Bridge, a geneticist at Columbia University, was studying Drosophila melanogaster. He discovered that combinations of several mutations induced lethality, while flies were viable with any single gene mutation. Twenty-four years later, Theodore Dobzhansky, also working at Columbia University, used the term "synthetic lethal" to describe these genetic interactions. Till now, the definition of synthetic lethality is well beyond the classical genetic interactions, as it refers to cell death caused by simultaneous inhibition of two non-lethal genes.