Where did rosalind franklin work
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here is probably no other woman scientist with as much controversy surrounding her life and work as Rosalind Franklin. Franklin was responsible for much of the research and discovery work that led to the understanding of the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, DNA. The story of DNA is a tale of competition and intrigue, told one way in James Watson's book The Double Helix, and quite another in Anne Sayre's study, Rosalind Franklin and DNA. James Watson, Francis Crick, and Maurice Wilkins received a Nobel Prize for the double-helix model of DNA in 1962, four years after Franklin's death at age 37 from ovarian cancer.
Franklin excelled at science and attended one of the few girls' schools in London that taught physics and chemistry. When she was 15, she decided to become a scientist. Her father was decidedly against higher education for women and wanted Rosalind to be a social worker. Ultimately he relented, and in 1938 she enrolled at Newnham College, Cambridge, graduating in 1941. She held a graduate fellowship for a year, but quit i
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Rosalind Franklin
British X-ray crystallographer (1920–1958)
This article is about the chemist. For the Mars rover named after her, see Rosalind Franklin (rover).
Rosalind Elsie Franklin (25 July 1920 – 16 April 1958)[1] was a British chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, coal, and graphite.[2] Although her works on coal and viruses were appreciated in her lifetime, Franklin's contributions to the discovery of the structure of DNA were largely unrecognised during her life, for which Franklin has been variously referred to as the "wronged heroine",[3] the "dark lady of DNA",[4] the "forgotten heroine",[5] a "feminist icon",[6] and the "Sylvia Plath of molecular biology".[7]
Franklin graduated in 1941 with a degree in natural sciences from Newnham College, Cambridge, and then enrolled for a PhD in physical chemistry under Ronald George Wreyford Norrish, the 19
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The Institute aims to better visualise the inner workings of life, and to draw new understanding from this, is one of the reasons we are named in honour of Rosalind Franklin. A great experimental scientist, Franklin worked on a number of diverse scientific problems, most famously DNA, bringing incredible experimental skill, technological expertise and knowledge from across the sciences.
Here, Professor Patricia Fara, President of the British Society for the History of Science (2016-18), Clare College, University of Cambridge, writes on the life and work of Rosalind Franklin, a great figure in interdisciplinary science.
In addition, to mark 100 years since the birth of Rosalind Franklin, we recorded a podcast series about her life, work and legacy – listen here.
Rosalind Elsie Franklin (1920-58)
Since her early death at the age of 37, Rosalind Franklin has become mythologised as the victim of male prejudice, the unsung heroine who took the crucial X-ray photograph enabling James Watson and Francis Crick to build their double helix model of DNA, and was unjustly depri
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