Regarding Rosalind Franklin, I knew nothing of her prior
to this thread, but I can surf with the best of 'em. ;)


Bruce Toback writes:

>Together with Rosalind Franklin, who worked with Watson and Crick to
>provide the chemistry expertise
[snip]

Near as I can tell, "worked with" is a bit kind.

It appears that Miss Franklin worked on a parallel -- perhaps even
"competing" -- effort.  A DNA photo she had taken was shown by an
associate of hers (and without her knowledge) to Watson and Crick.

Even after Watson and Crick reported their findings, she worked
to publish a report corroborating their results.


then Mark Wonsil:

> And I am told by my wife that she literally gave her life to her research.
> All of that X-ray crystallography induced a fatal case of leukemia.

Several sites stated that Ms. Franklin died of ovarian cancer, at age 37.
(No site specified any other cause.)


A few short, informative pages are:

   http://www.sdsc.edu/ScienceWomen/franklin.html
   http://www.accessexcellence.org/AB/BC/Rosalind_Franklin.html
   http://www.omega.dawsoncollege.qc.ca/ray/dna/franklin.htm

The final one includes a copy of the DNA photo.


Thanks for the lead on Miss Franklin, Bruce!

--Glenn