Read a biography of a scientists and their achievements and you often get the impression that all is lovely and friendly and well in the laboratory. Scientists are humans. They have personalities. There are nice ones and nasty ones and every other variation you will find in any other profession. One of the most famous feuds in science was over the structure of the molecule which makes you the individual that you are.

The DNA Wars were fought between various institutions and the people within them. It wasn't quite clear who was battling for which team some of the time, but there were a few key figures who star in the drama.

In 1950, James Watson joined the Cavendish Laboratories. Francis Crick, Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin and Linus Pauling were racing to determine the structure of DNA. That is when the war began.

Who would you have liked to have been at the start of the DNA war?


Linus Pauling

Linus Pauling (1901 – 1994) - at CalTech, USA

When asked why he became a scientist, Pauling's answer was simple: "I wanted to understand the world!" When our drama starts, he has already been credited with many brilliant achievements. Many consider him to be the greatest chemist of the twentieth century.

Pauling earned his Ph.D. in chemistry from the California Institute of Technology in 1925. His success was partly attributed to his ability to cross scientific boundaries. Pauling was the first to describe how atoms bonded to form a molecule which he pursued into the much more complex biological molecules. His group at CalTech was the first to determine the characteristics and structure of haemoglobin.

So when our DNA War starts, one contender is the most respected chemist in the world.

Francis Crick

Francis Crick (1916 – 2004) - at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge

Crick was not academically brilliant at school. He went to University College London when he was 18 to study physics.With a second-class degree, he went on to an undistinguished career in graduate school in experimental physics. During World War II, Crick became involved in war-related research at which he was much more successful than he had been as a student.

After the war, Crick continued to work for the Admiralty and studied chemistry and biology along with his physics. When he was 30 he gained a Medical Research Council studentship at Cambridge University, where he worked on crystallography at the Cavendish Laboratory. He started (again) on his PhD, this time in structural biology.

By the time he was 35, Crick still did not have his PhD. He just wasn't really into hard work. It was then that James Watson came to work at Cambridge.

James Watson

James Watson (1928 – ) at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge

James Watson was an academically strong student who was also a fanatical birdwatcher during his school years. He went to the University of Chicago, receiving his Bachelors degree in Zoology in 1947. He studied genetics, inspired by his interest in birds. This led him to Indiana University, Bloomington, where he received his PhD in Zoology in 1950.

In 1951, Watson met Maurice Wilkins at a Symposium in Naples. There he was shown the X-ray pattern from crystalline DNA. Excited by the image, he directed his research towards structural work on nucleic acids and proteins. He moved to the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge in 1951.

Watson is the brilliant young player on the stage, bursting with enthusiasm.

Maurice Wilkins

Maurice Wilkins (1916 – 2004) at the biophysics laboratory, King's College

Born in New Zealand, Wilkins' family moved to England when Maurice was six, so his father could further his studies in preventative medicine. Wilkins did well at school and later studied physics at St. John's College, Cambridge. In 1940 he received his Ph.D. in physics at the University of Birmingham.

During World War II, Wilkins moved to America to work on the Manhattan Project at the University of California, Berkeley. After two years, he returned to King's College London, where he pursued X-ray diffraction work on some excellent DNA samples from the Swiss scientist Rudolf Signer. This was not Wilkins' only project. He was a hard working scientist, destined to do well.

Wilkins had taken the X-ray diffraction photograph that so inspired James Watson. He also convinced Francis Crick of the importance of DNA.

In 1950, the Director of the King's College biophysics laboratory, John Randall, had arranged for a three year research fellowship for Rosalind Franklin, at that time working in Paris. Late in 1950, Randall wrote to Franklin to inform her that rather than work on protein, as she expected, she should use Wilkins' preliminary work and do X-ray studies of the DNA. Early in 1951, when Franklin finally arrived, Wilkins was away on holiday.

Rosalind Franklin

Rosalind Franklin (1920 - 1958) at the biophysics laboratory, King's College

Franklin attended St. Paul's Girls School where she excelled in science and mathematics as well as athletics. In 1938, she won scholarship to attended Cambridge University where she studied X-ray crystallography. With a Ph.D. she went to work in one of the most respected laboratories in Paris. She was very successful there, popular with her peers, enjoying fancy clothes and socializing with a wide group of friends. At the age of 30, Franklin decided to return to England to work for Randall at King's.

When Franklin arrived at the King's College lab in 1951, no work had been done on DNA for months. She used the DNA from Signer. Raymond Gosling, who had been working with Wilkins, became her PhD student. Franklin was led to believe that she has been assigned the project to work on DNA X-ray diffraction. Wilkins returned, expecting Franklin to work with him on DNA. Franklin would not collaborate with Wilkins. They worked separately on the same topic in the same laboratory.

This cast will battle over the glory of being the first to discover the structure of DNA.

Thinking about your personality and your interests, which of the above five people is closest to who you might have been?
If none of them share anything at all with you, then choose one character to focus on. You will be telling the story from their perspective in the third task.
Why did you choose the character you have?
What do you feel you may have in common with them, judging from the brief information given?