Why Didn’t Life Just Stay Boring?
Silvia Zeng
Published: 28/05/2024
Rosalind Franklin and her discovery of the DNA structure
Women have been instrumental in the advancement of science throughout history, yet their contributions have often been overlooked. One exemplary figure that revolutionised mankind´s prior understanding of genetics is Rosalind Franklin; she is considered the pioneer of the production of an X-ray photograph, enigmatically known as photograph 51, which has significantly helped to show the structure of DNA. In addition to contributing to the greatest biological discovery of the 20th century, Rosalind also won global recognition due to her contribution in two other fields: the structure of coal and the structure of viruses.
Born in 1920, she was the second child of an intellectually stimulating and socially well-connected family.
From the first years of her life, she was described as alarmingly clever attributable to her exceptional scholastic achievements and foremost because of her dedication to science topics.
Franklin's early education took place at St. Paul's Girls' School, where she excelled in every single subject. Some years later, she was studying physical chemistry at Newnham College, Cambridge University. After graduating, she was awarded a research fellowship at Cambridge, with which joined the physical chemistry laboratory. But the advance of World War II changed her course of action: in 1942 she gave up her fellowship in order to work for the British Coal Utilisation Research Association. There she got to investigate the physical chemistry of carbon´s porosity for the war effort. Therefore, she earned her Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Cambridge in 1945. Afterwards, she moved to Paris, where she honed her X-ray crystallography skills at the Laboratoire Central des Services Chimiques de l'État. That work was proved as being valuable for the cooking industry; she did research on the structural changes caused by the formation of graphite in heated carbons.
There, she applied X-ray diffraction methods to study the structure DNA using a new fine-focus X-ray tube and microcamera ordered by Wilkins, but which she refined and adjusted carefully. A critical innovation Franklin applied was making the camera chamber that could be controlled for its using different saturated salt solutions.
Incontinently she discovered that the DNA sample could live in two forms: at a relative humidity higher than 75%, the DNA fibre became long and thin; when it was drier, it became short and fat. She discovered the viscosity of
DNA and, more importantly, established that the pach was in a spiral conformation Franklin wrote the following:
The results suggest a helical structure containing 2, 3 or 4 co - axial nucleic acid chains per helical unit, and having the phosphate groups near the outside.
During 1952, they worked at applying the Patterson function to the X-ray pictures of DNA they had produced. Franklin was fully committed and was sternly against the theory, as she said, "We are not going to speculate, we are going to wait, we are going to let the spots on this photograph tell us what the [DNA] structure is."
Her Photo 51 was instrumental in identifying the double helix, although James Watson and Francis Crick, with Maurice Wilkins, used her data without her direct permission to build their DNA model. They published their findings in 1953 and received the Nobel Prize in 1962, but Franklin's critical contributions were largely unrecognised during her lifetime.
later moved to Birkbeck College in 1953, where she led groundbreaking research on the molecular structures of viruses, including the tobacco mosaic virus and the polio virus. Despite her significant achievements, Franklin faced challenges and conflicts, particularly at King’s College.
Franklin’s passed away due to ovarian cancer when she was 38 years old, in 1958.
Rosalind Franklin's meticulous work and ambitious research laid the groundwork for major scientific breakthroughs and inspired lots of women. Despite facing significant challenges and initially limited recognition, Rosalind made indelible contributions to our understanding of molecular biology and structural chemistry. She will never be forgotten and her legacy continues to inspire women scientists around the world.
Works Cited
Percec, Virgil. X-ray diffraction patterns of two forms of DNA: A-DNA and B-DNA. Originally published by Franklin and Gosling13 and reproduced from Klug.5 Copyright 2015 Elsevier. Qi Xiao, 11 March 2021. X-ray diffraction patterns of two forms of DNA: A-DNA and B-DNA. Originally published by Franklin and Gosling13 and reproduced from Klug.5 Copyright 2015 Elsevier.,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2451929421001005#section-cited-by.
"Photograph 51, by Rosalind Franklin (1952)". Dorothy Regan Haskett, 2019-12-30. Embryo Project Encyclopedia, https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/photograph-51-rosalind-franklin-1952.
Pruitt, Sarah. Rosalind Franklin’s Overlooked Role in the Discovery of DNA’s Structure. A&E Television Networks, March 25, 2024. HISTORY (Rosalind Franklin), https://www.history.com/news/rosalind-franklin-dna-discovery.
Watson, J. D., and F. H. C. Crick. Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid. No one, 25 April 1953. Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid, https://www.nature.com/articles/171737a0#author-information.