Rosalind Franklin was a physical chemist who lived from 1920-1958. She was the first person to take a photo of DNA (Deoxyribose nucleic acid, 1952). This required a lot of exposure to X-rays, resulting in massive amounts of radiation becoming exposed to her body. This radiation would later be one of the factors to cause her death.
Franklin had a colleague named Maurice Wilkins who didn’t like her because she was a woman. Mr. Wilkins was friends with another scientist named James Watson, who was working to build a 3D structure of DNA along with Francis Crick, who was yet another scientist. Mr. Watson was studying DNA for quite a while when Wilkins suggested that he show Franklin’s DNA picture to him. Watson of course agreed, but it wasn’t fair to Franklin as she didn’t give him the permission in the first place.
When Franklin left the photo on her desk after studying it, Wilkins secretly gave Watson a quick peek at it. Watson immediately knew what it was, and the next day, he told Crick that he knows what the DNA looks like. They eagerly got to work, and created a model that made perfect sense. Unfortunately for them, they didn’t know how to explain the thought process behind it.
Thus, they showed it to Rosalind Franklin, asking her if it “made sense”. She obviously thought it did, and Crick, Watson, and Wilkins told her that she could write part of the article to prove it made sense. She readily agreed, thinking that this was to her advantage, not theirs.
She ended up writing a small part of the article but receiving no recognition. Instead, Watson, Crick, and Maurice Wilkins were given the 1962 Nobel Prize for “building the first accurate model of DNA”. Franklin could not be a part of the glory as she had already died and the Nobel Prize could not be given to people who passed away.
Although Watson and Crick thought that they had gotten away, the whole incident was found out about later by a reporter. Franklin was a big contributor with our knowledge of DNA. Rosalind Franklin died of cancer without ever knowing about how much she contributed to the development of DNA.
Poem:
Radiation later killed her
Only was given a small bit of recognition
She was a physical chemist
As observant as she was she didn’t notice when she was being used
Late in her 30’s she died
Ideas of hers were stolen
None of her colleagues liked her because she was a woman
DNA photography was extremely hard but she managed to do it.
