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Title: The Third Man of the Double Helix: The Autobiography of Maurice Wilkins by Maurice Wilkins ISBN: 0-19-860665-6 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: November, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (3 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Is this the True Story of the Discovery of the Double Helix?
Comment: =====>
There is a joke by a famous comedian that asks who the three tenors are. Most people know two of them and the third man is known as "what's his name." The same situation occurs when you ask people who shared the 1962 Noble Prize (in physiology or medicine) for their discovery of the discovery of DNA (and other nucleic acid achievements). Most people say, "(Dr.) Watson, (Dr.) Crick, and what's his name."
What's his name is Dr. Maurice Wilkins (born: 1916). Most people are unaware that Wilkins was a brilliant physicist (he worked on the Manhattan or Atomic Bomb Project during World War Two) and later on was a biophysicist whose contribution was essential for discovering DNA's structure. Wilkins states this more eloquently: "[My] team of researchers at King's [College, a division of the University of London in the UK] laid the foundations for the double helix structure that Watson and Crick [both of whom worked together in a different UK laboratory] demonstrated so peruasively with their model in 1953."
Wilkins ten chapter autobiography is divided into three parts: those days before, during, and after the discovery of DNA's structure. This book contains almost forty black-and-white photographs. Wilkins' aim in writing this book was to tell his life story (that begins before he was born) and, perhaps more importantly, clear up "the tensions, accusations, confusions, and controversies that have attended the telling and retelling of the DNA story."
I felt that Wilkins was totally honest (and at a times naive) throughout this book. Some of the reasons I say he was honest are as follows:
(1) He was an octogenarian when this book was published and thus I feel he had nothing to hide at this advanced age.
(2) He reveals many aspects of his personal life that many people would be reticent to reveal, especially in print. For example, he tells us he "felt a bit suicidal at times."
(3) He says many times that in retrospect "he should of" or "he could of" done things differently. I got the impression that at times he was a bit hard on himself.
(4) Finally, he tells us that both he and Crick found Watson's book "The Double Helix" (1968) "distasteful." They both protested to Watson's publisher. (Wilkins said Watson's book was "badly written, juvenile, and in bad taste.") As a result the book was not published. (However, another publisher published it, and the rest is history.)
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Wilkins' book (at least for me) was the controversey surrounding Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958), an "x-ray [diffraction] specialist" who worked in the same lab as Wilkins. He gives us detailed information of what occurred. From other books (particularly the 1975 book by Ann Sayre), I learned that two major things occurred:
(1) There was tension between Frankin and Wilkins. I got the impression from these other books that this tension was due to personality and gender differences. Not true. Wilkins explains why this tension really arose and gives proof of his assertion.
(2) Wilkins gave a critical X-ray photograph (a reproduction of it is included in Wilkins' book) taken by Franklin to Watson without her permission. This photo gave Watson the concrete evidence for DNA's structure. Again, this is not entirely accurate according to Wilkins.
This critical X-ray photo brings up the question of the recognition Franklin should have received. For example, would she have been a contender for the Nobel Prize? I would say yes if this prize was only for determining the structure of DNA. But, as Wilkins explains, he, Crick, and Watson DID NOT receive the prize for this! I checked this out at the offical Nobel Prize internet site. (Note that the inside front and back flaps of Wilkins' book incorrectly says they were awarded the prize for discovering DNA's structure.)
Even so, was Franklin recognized for her achievements and contributions at this time? Watson and Crick did not recognize her for her achievements in their Nobel Prize lectures. However, Wilkins did recognize her (as well as others who made major contributions) in his lecture. (Their actual lectures can also be found at the official Nobel Prize internet site.)
Finally, I still have a few minor questions regarding Wilkins' story. However, my major question is as follows: "Why did he wait half a century after the discovery of DNA's structure to tell his side of the story?"
In conclusion, this autobiography shows that Wilkins was a decent, honest, and brilliant scientist. He also clears up any misconceptions regarding the discovery of the structure of DNA. Be sure to read this book so as to learn the true story of Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins and the true story of the discovery of the structure of DNA!!
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Rating: 4
Summary: A Good Man
Comment: The Third Man--The Autobiography of Maurice Wilkins
by Maurice Wilkins
Reviewed by Donald Siano
Wilkins was involved in one of the watershed scientific events of the twentieth century--the discovery of the double helical structure of DNA. He was the guy who really got the study of the x-ray diffraction studies going, and showed that the features seen were universal to a variety of different organisms, and therefore that it was an important scientific problem. He showed that the structure was probably helical, got Rosilind Franklin started on the problem, and was the link from her to Watson and Crick, who finally made the famous model that shook the world.
This book, published fifty years after, fills in some of the details of the event, correcting and contesting some claims made by others who have written on it. Some of his corrections are quite convincing. For example, a claim was made in one of the books on this affair that his research group contained only one other female, implying that he was something of a misogynist, while a picture of his laboratory coworkers in the book is about half female.
The tension between him and Franklin is made much of in historical accounts, and Wilkins unflinchingly covers this, and is pretty hard on himself too. The incident graphically shows how people from very different cultures (Franklin was a rich, pushy Jew) who are ostensibly working on a common goal can fail. Diversity in a laboratory group is not always the asset that the universal dogma asserts. His regrets and "could'a shoulda's" are revealing and even moving at times.
Another revelation in the book was his involvement in the Communist party, and his flirtation with Freudian psychology. A scientific education unfortunately appears not to immunize one completely from quackery.
The thing I took away from the book is how the simple stories generated and perpetuated in the mass media and in historical accounts are almost always wrong in important ways. Scientific discoveries and important inventions are almost always complicated events, only part of which is even known and understood by any single writer or even the actors involved. But more than that, practically every writer has his prejudices and angles to massage. Autobiographers are no exception to this, but Wilkins has added to our understanding, and should only be applauded for it.
Rating: 3
Summary: Wilkins and the DNA structure
Comment: Maurice Wilkins was a first-rate scientist who was deeply involved in the most important scientific discovery of the 20th century- the discovery of the structure of DNA.
His story needs to be told, since he has been written about often by authors such as Watson, Crick, Anne Sayre, Brenda Maddox and others.
He was a central figure in the continuing saga of Rosalind
Franklin and her "Photograph 51", recently the subject of a televison documentary of the same title, and a previous BBC
special produced by Peter Goodchild some ten years ago.
He was clearly not the equal of Rosalind Franklin in
experimental ability, nor of Watson and Crick in their aggressive utilization of the work of others.
Perhaps the key story of this book was Wilkins' graciously declining co-authorship of the basic DNA Publication in Nature, which also, much to the relief of Watson and Crick, avoided having to acknowledge how they obtained Photograph 51.
As Sir John Maddox said recently, "If all these publications had arrived at Nature when I was Editor, I would have smelled a rat"
In any case, Wilkins comes off as a thoroughly decent person, although one wonders why he permitted the consistent publication
of articles representing Rosalind Franklin as one of his subordinates- which she never was.
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Title: Rosalind Franklin : The Dark Lady of DNA by Brenda Maddox ISBN: 0060985089 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 30 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: My Life in Science by Sydney Brenner, Dr. Sydney Brenner ISBN: 0954027809 Publisher: BioMed Central, Ltd. Pub. Date: 01 June, 2001 List Price(USD): $22.10 |
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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: How to Win the Nobel Prize: An Unexpected Life in Science by J. Michael Bishop ISBN: 0674008804 Publisher: Harvard Univ Pr Pub. Date: June, 2003 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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Title: Genes, Girls, and Gamow: After the Double Helix by James D. Watson ISBN: 0375412832 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 29 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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