Raymond Gosling

Raymond Gosling (2006)

Raymond Gosling (born July 15, 1926 in Wembley ; † May 18, 2015 ) was a British physicist who, together with Rosalind Franklin, published a clear X-ray image of DNA for the first time in an article in the journal Nature in 1953 . He was the often overlooked fifth person in the history of the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, the key to the secret of life. The names of Francis Crick and James Watson of the University of Cambridge are commonly associated with the discovery that won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine with Maurice Wilkins of King's College London , while other researchers worked out the basic data that Crick and Watson did needed to fabricate the overall picture of the discovery.

Together with Rosalind Franklin, on the basis of his own geometrical considerations, he had also given an approximation formula for determining the fiber tilt angle β and thus developed the fundamentals in the field of fiber diffraction .

Life

Studies and employees of the KCL laboratory

Gosling, son of an artist and cabinetmaker and an opera singer, began after visiting the Preston Manor- Grammar School , a physics degree at University College London (UCL), where he graduated 1947th He originally intended to continue his postgraduate studies there, but then moved to King's College London , where John Turton Randall took over the Charles Wheatstone Professorship in Physics. This began with the development of new teaching methods that encouraged collaboration between different disciplines, which other university staff mockingly referred to as Randall's Circus . However, Randall felt that Gosling would need to expand his knowledge of biology and zoology before joining his research team . After evening studies and a position as a visiting physicist, he worked with Maurice Wilkins on X-ray diffraction for the analysis of DNA samples.

Gosling was a student at the time with Maurice Wilkins, who in 1950 was the first to take an X-ray of a DNA fiber, an image that inspired the young James Watson after seeing it when Wilkins gave a speech at a conference in Naples . The much more famous Photo 51 was taken in May 1952 and is usually attributed to Rosalind Franklin, although it was actually taken by Gosling. When Crick and Watson published their famous article in the April 23, 1953 issue of Nature, describing the structure of DNA, they did not include any data from experiments and did not fully appreciate the work of the scientists at King's College, although those scientists did theirs Data published in two articles in the same issue. One article was written by Wilkins, Alec Stokes, and Herbert Wilson , while the other article on X-ray diffraction was written by Rosalind Franklin and Gosling.

However, the first attempts at photography of DNA, prepared by Wilkins by wrapping fibers around a paper clip that were held in place by small drops of glue, proved unsatisfactory. In an attempt to keep the camera airtight so that the DNA could be photographed in an atmosphere of pure hydrogen , Gosling experimented with a number of sealants. However, he couldn't find a way to work with the heavy brass collimator tube . When he pointed Wilkins how far he had come, he was surprised and concerned when he Wilkins, a rather shy man, a condom brand Durex was and said, "Here, little Raymond, this crimp to the collimator" (, Here 'little Raymond, put this round the collimator').

The condom fit the bill, and Gosling was lucky that the strands of DNA absorbed by the moisture in the air unexpectedly crystallized, enabling him to produce the image that revealed the tell-tale diffraction sites that so excited James Watson. Gosling recalled it as follows: "I vividly remember the excitement of showing this thing to Watson and drinking his sherry from his glass ... in one sip" ('I can still vividly remember the excitement of showing this thing to Wilkins and drinking his sherry by the glass ... by the gulpful ').

Discovery of the double helix structure of DNA

Gosling was thus the often overlooked fifth person in the history of the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, the key to the secret of life. The names of Francis Crick and James Watson of the University of Cambridge are commonly associated with the discovery that won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine with Maurice Wilkins of King's College London, while other researchers worked out the basic data that Crick and Watson did needed to fabricate the overall picture of the discovery.

Gosling, however, was reluctant and never expressed disappointment that his role in the discovery of the double helix structure was overlooked and drew any appreciation to John Turton Randall, laboratory director at King's College, whose view that DNA is an agent of genetic inheritance must be and the consequent determination to discover its structure guided all their research.

Attention later turned to the biochemist Rosalind Franklin, a colleague of Wilkins' college at King's College London, who suffered from male chauvinism of the 1950s and died prematurely in 1958 to have a share in the Nobel Prize. It was their X-ray crystallographic skills that led to Photo 51 , the image that gave Crick and Watson the crucial clues as to the dimensions and angles of the DNA molecule that made the two University of Cambridge researchers their famous Setting up a model of the double helix. There is no doubt that Rosalind Franklin's role was significant. However, her posthumously acquired status as a feminist icon obscured the fact that it was indeed Gosling who created the crucial x-rays that provided the key to deciphering the puzzle.

Tensions between the researchers and Gosling's role

Gosling, however, was uninvolved in the break-up of the relationship between Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin, which arrived at King's College London in 1951 when Wilkins was on vacation. British science etiquette believed that only Wilkins and his team were working on the problem of DNA structure. However, Gosling recalled: "Randall wrote to Rosalind that she should lead the crystallographic X-ray work on the DNA material, but I didn't know about it" ('Randall actually wrote to Rosalind saying that she would be asked to direct the X-ray crystallographic work on the DNA material, and I didn't know that he'd done that '). Wilkins resented this interference, so Randall Gosling withdrew from Wilkins' team and assigned him to Rosalind Franklin as their technician and student.

Gosling believed that the tension between the two scientists was probably caused by Randall's intervention: "He thought it would make them competitive and improve their work" ('He thought it would make them competitive and improve their work'). He himself found himself caught in the middle between the two: “It was terrible, terrible. I spent my life going from one to the other, handing messages, trying to play the peacemaker ”('It was terrible, terrible,' he recalled. 'I spent my life going from one to the other, giving messages, trying to play the peacemaker '). The dispute finally ended with Randall Rosalind Franklin advised to go better, although the DNA work was not yet completed and her work at a 1953 Birkbeck College of the University of London mediated.

Ph.D. and university professors

Due to his attachment to her, Gosling wrote his dissertation for the acquisition of the Doctor of Philosophy ( Ph.D. ) not at King's College London, but with Rosalind Franklin. He hoped then to continue his research DNA and was convinced that it would approximately take a year, would be able to scientists, the breakthrough to find ways to cancer cure. However, this hope turned out to be false and he turned to other issues.

After his promotion Gosling was first lecturer of physics at Queen's College of Oxford University , then at the University of St Andrews and later at the University of the West Indies .

After his return to Great Britain in 1967 he became a lecturer at Guy's Hospital , which was part of King's College London as a medical faculty, and developed devices for the research and diagnosis of arteriosclerosis . In 1984 he finally took over a professorship for medical physics at Guy's Hospital.

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personal data
SURNAME	Gosling, Raymond
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	British physicist
DATE OF BIRTH	July 15, 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH	Wembley , England
DATE OF DEATH	May 18, 2015