This is my report about the discovery of the structure of
deoxyribose nucleic acid (DNA) as told by James Watson.
Watson and another scientist named Francis Crick discovered
the structure of this hereditary molecule. These two scientists
discovered that DNA was much more important than originally
thought by most of the scientists. Watson and Crick used the
findings of other scientists with their pursuit to become famous
before someone else found the answer.
James Watson was an American that went to Cambridge
University to do scientific research and experiments. He
always had this fantasy of discovering the DNA structure and
becoming famous. Watson always kept trying to work on it
and even had to report on things that he had not even been
working on. No one, it seemed, thought that DNA was
something that needed to be researched thoroughly.
Eventually, Watson became friends with Francis Crick who
shared Watson’s interest in DNA. They decided to help each
other to find the answer. Watson and Crick started to build
models of what they thought the DNA structure might look like.
To do this, they needed data from other scientists.
Watson and Crick used Rosalind Franklin’s X-ray work on
DNA to try to decide if DNA was helical and if so how many
helixes was its structure composed of. The first X-ray
The Essay on Chance Or Planning Watson And Crick
... Pauling were other scientists that were extremely close to discovering the structure of DNA at the same time as Watson and Crick. They all had ... converted many non-believers into believing his radical form of thought. A Cambridge painter once stated that, '... the important thing is ...
photograph of crystalline DNA in the A form did not show
clearly that DNA was in fact helical when Franklin observed it.
When Watson and Crick created a DNA model with helixes,
Franklin was the first to object. They still believed that DNA
was helical and intended to prove it even though their model
was wrong because of other reasons as well. Watson knows
that sometimes scientists are wrong. This is good to know
because it shows what a struggle it was to figure out anything
if you do not know for sure if the information is right or wrong.
Later on, another X-ray photograph was taken of
crystalline DNA but this time in the B form. This showed a
great contrast between the B form and the A form. The B form
showed the probability that there were in fact two helixes and
forced Franklin to reevaluate her previous conclusion.
Bases were part of the DNA structure. The purines are
adenine and guanine and the pyrimidines are cytosine and
thymine. Watson began to think that a like-with-like model was
the correct arrangement of the bases. The problem with that
assumption is that purines have two rings and are bulkier than
pyrimidines. The purine-purine is bulkier than the
pyrimidines-pyrimidines and would cause bulges in the shape
of the DNA. This was not shown in the x-ray photograph so
this could not occur. The correct arrangement is
purine-pyrimidine. Rosalind Franklin’s X-ray data convinced her
that the bases were at the center of the structure, and this
proved to be correct.
Watson then uses a suggestion of Jerry Donohue and
decides that there are hydrogen bonds between the bases.
The tautomeric shift is the hydrogen atoms that can go
through the changes in position. The sugar-phosphate chains
were placed along the outside of the model, as Rosalind
Franklin had said. At first, Watson and Crick decided that the
sugar-phosphate backbone should be near the center to
ensure the regularity of the DNA structure. They soon realized
that could not be. The negatively charged phosphate ions
would repel each other, so the structure was not possible.
James Watson and Francis Crick were the last people to finish a
problem that had been around for a while. I think that they used
The Essay on DNA – Finding Your Roots
We, people are related species that have lot of things in common. We all originated from a same ancestor Homo sapiens who were mutual parents in the past. When we compare one another genetically, we both possess 99.9% of genome sequence identical. It depicts that we all originated from a same blood and entirely related to one another. If we track our ancestors, long way behind we will find the ...
many others and they received almost all of the credit. The other
scientist that was proved wrong about his structure of DNA should
have been told by either Crick or Watson of his mistake. They knew
of the mistake before most people and thought that they could buy a
couple more days to figure it out for themselves before he found out
he was wrong. Watson said he knew that when this scientist was
proved wrong he would work day and night to regain his former
reputation. They did not want to give Pauling time to reconfigure his
hypothesis and basically took it away from him. That is okay though.
What else are you supposed to do? I would probably do the same.
Another instance of how scientists can really be is when Watson and
Crick started to work with DNA in the first place. They knew that
someone already was working on DNA and they did not ask for
permission before beginning. Watson eventually asked him and he
said it was alright. James said he would not have stopped
experimenting anyway. Is that what scientists do? I guess it is no
different then any other profession, so it does not make me think any
less of them. Overall, I thought the book was good but a little boring
and confusing. I lost track of all the different scientists. Watson kept
using both their first and last names when talking about them and I
could not figure out who was who. I think this was a great discovery
and I now know how the scientific process works.
