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Title: Rosalind Franklin : The Dark Lady of DNA by Brenda Maddox ISBN: 0-06-098508-9 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 30 September, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (7 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A fine biography of one of the great crystallographers
Comment: I was initially drawn to this book (as will most other readers I imagine) by the controversy surrounding Rosalind Franklin in the discovery of the structure of the DNA helix. Instead, I was undeservingly rewarded with a fine biography of a character every bit as complex and fascinating as a heroine in a Henry James novel: a rich, head-strong English Jewish girl, blessed with a burning passion for science, talented but trapped in the chauvinistic world of post-war English science. She spent her life split between the sunny sophistication of France and the sobriety of England. Her professional life occurred through the Second World War, and the post-war period, providing a rich background for the biography.
On the DNA controversy, Brenda Fox gives the most compelling account that I have read of what actually happened: if anything, Franklin was a victim of the fractious atmosphere created by J.T. Randall, head of the department of Biophysics at King's college. By not clarifying the working relations between Wilkins, Franklin and their students, Randall deliberately created an ugly turf war. That Watson and Crick got to see her data was a result of confusion rather than espionage.
Yet, the question is often raised that Franklin was not capable of solving the structure on her own. To answer that question, one only has to follow her later career to find out that she was truly one of the great crystallographers. Her elucidation of the structure of the tobacco mosaic virus was a technical achievement easily rivalling that of DNA, and might have led to a Nobel-prize if not for her early death. Indeed, her junior collaborator on the mosaic virus, Aaron Klug, would go on to win a Nobel prize himself, citing Franklin as his greatest mentor in his Nobel-prize speech (a high honour amongst scientists). Brenda Fox unearths a voluminous amount of material, which shows that Franklin was careful rather than unimaginative, as some have claimed. In a more supportive atmosphere, Franklin would have solved the DNA structure herself. However, Watson and Crick built on so many of Franklin's results (that DNA was helical, that the phosphates are on the outside, that there are 2 forms of DNA) that the real scandal is that they lied in their paper about having come to the model through pure theory alone.
Brenda Fox paints a magnetic portrait of Franklin - a woman who was alternatively gregarious and witty, with a penchant for all things French (a very fine prejudice indeed), yet was also cold, hostile and aristocratically overbearing. Her relations with the men in her life were complex and dissected with sympathetic acumen by Brenda Fox. In short, I came away with the impression that Rosalind Franklin was someone I would have liked to have known. I can think of no greater praise for a biography than that.
p.s. just a little note to a previous reviewer: crystallography in proteins is alive and well: the 2003 Chemistry Nobel-prize went to Rod McKinnon for the crystal structure of the potassium channel, in 1997, it went to John Walker for the structure of ATP-synthase.
Rating: 5
Summary: Great scientist, good woman cheated of recognition...
Comment: Gee, it's amazing how little has changed over the past 50-odd years. They just released a report (National Science Foundation) showing how few women and minorities have places of importance in research and clinical science throughout the U.S. and her universities and corporations. It's a major struggle still to try to be a scientist, whether you are a woman, whether you are slightly older then the normal student, whether you are a racial minority, or an 'ability' minority. I should know: I was three of the above, and many of my professors in med school for Neuroscience (research) made my life miserable to the point of having to leave the program.
Rosalind Franklin accomplished a lot in her short life. She was a magnificent crystallographer: A science which is not used much anymore, but without whom we could not elucidated much in chemistry and biology. Unfortunately, she had many detractors, one of whom is James Watson. Those of us involved and embroiled in bioethics and disability do not have a very high opinion of this man anyway, because of statements made in the last few years involving genetics about 'getting rid of all the ugly women' and 'the lower IQ 10% in society" (there will always be a lower 10% no matter how many people you 'rid' society of until you get to just James Watson!). This book just confirmed that what I thought was the rantings of an old man, were actually the confirmed prejudices of a chauvinistic scientist.
If it had not been for Franklin, Watson and Crick would not have quickly reached their 'eureka' moment in determining the structure of DNA. The work of Franklin which was in for publishing was more or less handed to Watson and Crick, and her photography was seen by Watson without her permission. She walked into her office to find Watson going through her work...it's amazing that this information has not been recognized by now. Ethically, WAtson and Crick made use of her work, without giving her recognition. And since the Nobel Prize is not awarded posthumously, she was not included in the recognition. Makes you wonder if she had lived, given the obvious prejudice against women still in science, if she would have been recognized. Few women are. In fact, in the last few years, I cannot remember a single woman in science being recognized by the Nobel Committee.
It's time to rectify this injustice. I would hope and suggest that some other group such as Microsoft would provide a grant such as Nobel's that recognizes both minorities and women in science and technology whose work has provided much needed diversity in thought and in science (whether living or dead). The Prize could set up chairs or fund work in the name of Rosalind Franklin and provide the real history behind the discovery of DNA, as well as give her family the retroactive place of pride that they should have in her. Such a prize would also encourage young women and minorities, whether racial or ability or cultural, with the mentors they need to encourage them to go into science. Without diversity, the prejudices of a few become major social programs, especially in genetics. A return to eugenics would be less likely to happen if science is diverse.
Karen L. SAdler,
Science Education,
University of Pittsburgh
Rating: 5
Summary: Fragile Excellence
Comment: Brenda Maddox writes a book that amalgamates her subject's technical performance with her human frailties. She presents Rosalind Franklin as technically gifted and thorough to a degree most mortals would not comprehend, with a personality that is simultaneously beautiful & hostile, fragile & robust, all in the one human being.
What is refreshing is Maddox' honesty in dealing with her subject, and the intense warmth she brings to her. The counterpoint of Rosalind's scientific brilliance on the one hand and her vulnerability on the other makes her an absorbing character. She inspires as being prosaic at one level, artless at another and exceptionally diligent and intelligent.
But in the end Brenda Maddox leaves another message - that Rosalind Franklin despite her strengths and weaknesses, was beautifully human. And this is the refreshing part.
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Title: Rosalind Franklin and DNA by Anne Sayre ISBN: 0393320448 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: July, 2000 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA by James D. Watson ISBN: 074321630X Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: 12 June, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Third Man of the Double Helix: The Autobiography of Maurice Wilkins by Maurice Wilkins ISBN: 0198606656 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: DNA: The Secret of Life by James D. Watson, Andrew Berry ISBN: 0375415467 Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf Pub. Date: 01 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: Genes, Girls, and Gamow: After the Double Helix by James D. Watson ISBN: 0375412832 Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf Pub. Date: 29 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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