Technical Notes
Papers of Rosalind Franklin Added to Profiles in Science®
The National Library of Medicine® announces the release of an extensive selection from the papers of Rosalind Franklin, a chemist and crystallographer who did groundbreaking work in shedding light on the structure of DNA, on its Profiles in Science Web site.
Franklin began her scientific career analyzing the structure of coal and carbon during World War II, and became an internationally recognized expert in that field. For five years before her premature death, she did pathbreaking research that elucidated the structure of plant viruses. Yet chemist and crystallographer Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958) is now best known for the research that occupied her briefly: the structure of DNA.
Early in 1953, when Francis Crick and James Watson were struggling to build an accurate theoretical model of the DNA molecule, it was Franklin's meticulous X-ray diffraction photos and analyses that gave them crucial clues to DNA's structure, and allowed them to win the race for the double helix. Franklin didn't know that there was a race going on, and she never knew that Crick and Watson had access to her then, unpublished data.
The online exhibit features correspondence, published articles, photos, lab notebooks, and reports from Franklin's files. An introductory exhibit section places Franklin's achievements in historical context.
