Franklin, Crick and Watson

Franklin, Crick, and Watson Scientists who discovered the STRUCTURE OF 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.

Franklin’s Photo 51 helped Crick and Watson complete the DNA structure.

DNA is a chemical code inside every creature’s cells, giving instructions on how cells work and grow. By the way… Personality clashes with some of my laboratory colleagues earned me the nickname “the dark lady of DNA”.

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 double helix structure of DNA resembles a spiral staircase.

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. 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.

At the same time as Franklin, English scientist Francis Crick and American scientist James Watson were working on their own model of the structure of DNA. They were shown Photo 51 by Franklin’s colleague Maurice Wilkins. Together with their own work, this photograph helped them confirm the double helix structure and meant the duo could complete their model, called the secret of life in 1953.

What came after…

Did you know? Rosalind Franklin is now receiving recognition for her contribution to understanding DNA, with colleges and scholarships in her name.

Forensic science has evolved thanks to DNA. The police can find a criminal using DNA traces left at the crime scene, in things such as blood, saliva, skin, and hair. Scientists can clone animals by making a copy of their DNA.

Born in Scotland in 1996,

Dolly the sheep was the world’s first cloned animal.

Recognition

Franklin died in 1958, probably as a result of radiation exposure from X-rays. Crick, Watson, and Maurice Wilkins went on to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1962 for their DNA structure. Franklin received NO CREDIT as the prize can only be given to living scientists.

How they changed the world DNA can be used to identify any individual as everyone has their own unique chemical code.

The structure of DNA proved a monumental moment in scientific history, impacting on genetic development, medical research, and forensic analysis.