Sydney Brenner (born 13 January 1927) is a South African biologist and a 2002 Nobel prize in Physiology or Medicine laureate, shared with H. Robert Horvitz and John Sulston. Brenner made significant contributions to work on the genetic code, and other areas of molecular biology. He established the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans as a model organism for the investigation of developmental biology. Brenner made several seminal contributions to the emerging field of molecular biology in the 1960s. The first was proving that all overlapping genetic coding sequences were impossible. Brenner is known for his penetrating scientific insight and acerbic wit.