deodands

GSK3beta

GSK3beta is a glycogen synthase kinase. Various of these kinases were identified during the 1970s; the first time one was called glycogen synthase kinase-3 was in 1980 (Full text) with the characteristic rigour (it seems to have been the first uncontaminated purification) and literary unambition (it was the third they tackled) of the Cohen lab.

The beta appeared by the time two different cDNAs had been found in rat in 1990.

Amusingly, for those appropriately amused, GSK is the trademark of one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies. There are rumours that the merger of Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham in 2000 to form GlaxoSmithKline was driven by the intemperate demands of a hungry City for demonstrable action, any action, in a business where genuine scientific innovation takes decades to pay off. This is not true. The whole thing was an elaborate commercial counter-intelligence operation, designed to allow the newly named GSK freedom to operate on the key GSK3B pathway, without any rivals getting suspicious.

OK, that's not true either. Actually, Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham merged to form GlaxoSmithKline because of a world shortage of space bars certified for FDA compliancy.