today’s scientist is a name you may already be familiar with: rosalind franklin! although not entirely ignored, franklin’s contributions to modern science are often underplayed and under appreciated. she worked on several different projects in her lifetime, and specialized in x-ray diffraction.
franklin began her scientific research at the university of cambridge, studying the porosity of coal. her research allowed her to classify different coals and predict their performance for various purposes, such as gas masks. she went on to study coal and carbon at a french laboratory, coining the terms graphitizing and non-graphitizing carbon. franklin’s work informed a significant portion of the mainstream physics and chemistry of carbon and coal, but her most significant work was yet to come.
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in 1950, franklin began working at kings college london. as the only experienced diffraction researcher there, her skills were quickly diverted to research on dna, which at the time was a rapidly growing field. she instantly came into conflict with maurice wilkins, another dna researcher, who apparently didn’t take kindly to a woman taking over his work. in 1952, franklin and her student gosling succeeded in taking photo 51, the most famous x-ray diffraction image of dna. in january 1953, wilkins, without franklin’s permission, showed photo 51 to watson and crick, two other researchers who were trying to identify the structure of dna. both franklin and watson and crick discovered the double helix structure of dna and published their results at roughly the same time. however, watson and crick incorrectly claimed that franklin’s work was simply confirmation of their work and not an independent discovery. the only acknowledgement that they gave was a brief footnote stating that their discovery was “stimulated by a general knowledge of” franklin and wilkins—in reality, their discovery was founded on franklin and gosling’s work. in 1962, 4 years after franklin’s death, watson, crick, and wilkins were awarded the nobel prize for their work in dna research, a prize that should have belonged to franklin instead.
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franklin didn’t stop her research after her revolutionary discoveries about dna. she went on to research the structure of viruses at birkbeck college. in 1956, she was diagnosed with cancer, but she continued to work, churning out 7 papers in 1956 and 6 papers in 1957. finally, near the end of 1957, she was forced to retire, and passed away in 1958. her coworker aaron klug (who later became one of the most fervent defenders of franklin’s contribution to dna) took over her research, leading to breakthroughs on the structure of the polio virus.
to recap: franklin made a whole lot of discoveries that she wasn’t given nearly enough credit for. her work was exploited and taken credit for time and time again. rosalind franklin was an incredibly strong woman who made huge strides in physics, chemistry, and biology. let’s not let history erase her name, the way watson and crick intended.
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"It's very pretty, but how are they going to prove it?”
-Rosalind Franklin, after seeing Watson and Crick's preliminary model for DNA
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(written 3/12/21)
