Part 2 Introduction

In 1953 James Watson and Francis Crick interpreted a now iconic image taken by Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling. Franklin and Gosling had used X-rays to photograph a crystallized sample of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). By analyzing the fuzzy two-dimensional crossed-ladder image of the molecule (...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inAssembling Arguments p. 41
Main Author Jonathan Buehl
Format Book Chapter
LanguageEnglish
Published University of South Carolina Press 20.01.2016
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Summary:In 1953 James Watson and Francis Crick interpreted a now iconic image taken by Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling. Franklin and Gosling had used X-rays to photograph a crystallized sample of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). By analyzing the fuzzy two-dimensional crossed-ladder image of the molecule (figure 2.2), Watson and Crick were able to interpret the elegant double-helical structure of DNA and ultimately to infer its function from this structure.* This achievement and other monumental discoveries in molecular biochemistry—such as Kendrew’s mapping of myoglobin (1958), Perutz’s mapping of hemoglobin (1959), and Hodgkin’s mapping of insulin (1969)—are part of a tradition
ISBN:1611175615
9781611175615