notes and pictures. Maurice Wilkins, also willing to be deceptive, secretly copies Franklin’s data and shows it to Watson and Crick, along with an X-ray picture. This information points Watson and Crick in the right direction and leads specifically to an accurate model of the structure of DNA. When the Nobel Prize is awarded in 1962 for the discovery, however, Franklin is not among the recipients. In 1958, at age 37, she died of cancer without ever knowing how her work had been used to propel three male colleagues into scientific history.

Linus Pauling Linus Pauling is a chemist at the California Institute of Technology (Cal Tech) in Pasadena, California. He is considered one of the world’s foremost scientists and is Watson and Crick’s greatest rival in the race to discover the structure of DNA. In 1951, before Watson begins concentrating solely on DNA, Pauling appears to be getting closer to the answer. He writes to Wilkins in London asking for copies of the crystalline DNA X-ray photographs that Wilkins and Franklin have produced. Wilkins, however, stalls Pauling by telling him the data needs a closer look before he can release the pictures.

Watson knows up front that his chief competitor is Pauling and that Watson’s own deficiency in understanding X rays is a stumbling block in catching up to the Cal Tech chemist, much less surpassing Pauling in his research. This is one of the major reasons that Watson ends up at the Cambridge lab— to learn the mathematical details of crystalline Xray photography without having to let Pauling know that he is a ‘‘mathematically deficient biologist,’’ as he calls himself.

Pauling has already discovered the ‘‘alpha helix’’ molecule (the structure of other proteins and a precursor to the double helix structure of the DNA molecule), and he did so by building models of possible configurations out of molded plastic pieces. Watson and Crick copy Pauling’s method in their own research when building the double helix. When Pauling finally announces that he has solved the DNA problem with a triple helix structure, it does not take long for the scientific community to prove the theory wrong. Watson and Crick know that Pauling is about to embarrass himself by publishing an erroneous theory, but, instead of warning him, they bask in their rival’s humiliating defeat.

Peter Pauling Peter Pauling is the son of Linus Pauling. Peter is accepted as a research student at the Cavendish lab in Cambridge, where he eventually shares an office with Watson and Crick. Peter shares letters from his father in which the older Pauling describes his DNA research at Cal Tech. Peter also shows his officemates the preliminary paper his father has written on the triple helix—an erroneous theory that the older Pauling will publish with no forewarning from his eager competitors.

Max Perutz Max Perutz is an Austrian-born chemist working at the Cavendish lab primarily in the area of Xray diffraction. He is a close colleague of Bragg and is the leader of Crick’s unit at the lab. When Watson arrives in Cambridge, his first assignment is to work under Perutz learning X-ray crystallography. Perutz is a tolerant, friendly person who often acts as a mediator between Crick and Bragg.

Rosy See Rosalind Franklin

James D. Watson As the author and main figure in The Double Helix, James Watson presents exactly what the subtitle of his book claims: a personal account of his work as a scientist. Watson is a young genius in his field at the time the events in the book take place, but he does not demonstrate a know-it-all arrogance. He is also willing to criticize himself, which he does fairly often in the book. During the two years he spends at the Cavendish laboratory, his work on X-ray crystallography and on building a model of DNA often leads him down the wrong path, and he readily admits it.

Watson’s closest colleague is Francis Crick, but there are three other people who play a major role in this story. In the book’s opening paragraphs, Watson claims, ‘‘I knew the tale was not simple and certainly not as the newspapers reported. Chiefly it was a matter of five people: Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin, Linus Pauling, Francis Crick, and me.’’ Watson makes Crick the topic of the first chapter, stating, ‘‘Francis was the dominant force in shaping my part.’’ He credits Crick’s role so highly not only because the two men share a passion for finding the secret of DNA but also because they are able to tolerate each other’s personality quirks and annoying habits. Watson’s relationship with Rosalind Franklin is also important but for a much different reason. Female scientists are not always highly regarded in the male-dominated profession, and Watson’s account demonstrates the subtle undermining of Franklin’s contribution to the discovery of DNA, as well as blatant discriminatory language, which he later regrets.

Watson does not pretend to be all business in his endeavor to unravel one of science’s greatest mysteries. He enjoys drinking and spends many evenings in English pubs. He is always on the lookout for a pretty face and does not shy away from discussing his attraction to a variety of women. Furthermore, some have said that his account is unprofessionally candid when it comes to describing colleagues and their relationships with him, as well as among themselves. Perhaps the most striking characteristic about Watson is his childlike honesty in telling a story the way that he remembers it. Regardless of whose toes are stepped on or whose personal conflicts are paraded in public, Watson is simply blunt when speaking his mind, never hesitating to display his own faults along with everyone else’s.

Maurice Wilkins Maurice Wilkins is a physicist-turned-biologist working at the University of London’s King’s College. (There is also a King’s College in Cambridge, and both are mentioned in the book.) Wilkins is the foremost scientist studying the molecular structure of DNA, at least before Watson and Crick arrive on the scene at the Cavendish lab in Cambridge. Wilkins becomes acquainted with Crick first, and he is the primary reason that Crick does not turn his attention to the study of DNA prior to meeting Watson. As Watson points out, there is a scientific code of ethics in England that prevents one scientist from honing in on a problem that a colleague has been studying for years, and solving the DNA puzzle at that time was ‘‘the personal property of Maurice Wilkins.’’ Ironically, Watson also credits Wilkins with being the one ‘‘who had first excited me about X-ray work on DNA.’’ Wilkins had given a lecture on the topic at a scientific conference in Naples in early 1951, and Watson was in attendance.

Throughout Watson’s account, Wilkins is a leading figure in sharing information with Watson and Crick, even though he and Rosalind Franklin are actually competing with the two Cavendish scientists. There is no malicious tension between these two teams as there is between Watson and Crick and their rival in America, Linus Pauling. For Wilkins, the greatest tension comes from his own ‘‘partner,’’ Rosalind Franklin. According to Watson, Wilkins treats Franklin more as an assistant (and Watson refers to her as such) instead of an equal—even though she is an expert crystallographer and a great asset in learning about DNA through X-ray diffraction. The tension between Wilkins and Franklin is a major distraction to their work. Both persist, however, and Wilkins eventually ends up sharing the 1962 Nobel Prize with Watson and Crick.