, n i l k n a r d F n a , k c i n Cr e o h t s t d e r a e W ts who discovF LIFE
Cracking the DNA model was a combined effort, but while Crick and Watson found themselves in the limelight, Franklin was left in the shadows.
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Rosalind Franklin Born in London in 1920, Rosalind Franklin set her heart on science. She gained a PhD in 1945 before moving to Paris to study the CRYSTAL STRUCTURES of chemicals using X-rays. By the 1950s, many scientists were studying deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) – the chemical found inside cells of living things. Back at King’s College laboratory in London, Franklin took X-ray photographs of DNA crystals. In one of these, which she labelled Photo 51, she spotted a two-part spiral, called a double helix structure.
The struc double h elix ture resemof DNA spira l stairbles a case.
Who came before… In 1866, German biologist Ernst HaEckEl made a breakthrough when he suggested that the genetic material inherited between generations is located in the nucleus of each body cell. 42
Englishman William HEnry Bragg and Australian-born William laWrEncE Bragg used X-rays to study crystal structures and explain diffraction in 1915. They became the first father and son team to share a Nobel Prize.
William Lawrence Bragg
