The Annotated and Illustrated Double Helix

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Watson, Frances Crick, Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin and a scientific revolution. In his 1968 memoir, The Double Helix, James Watson offered a thrilling drama of the race among scientists to identify the structure of DNA. Professors Alexander Gann and Jan Witkowski have built upon this narrative; juxtaposing Watsons' racy account with the commentary of other protagonists offering an enhanced perspective of the now legendary story. They have mined many sources: including a trove of newly discovered correspondence belonging to Francis Crick mislaid some fifty years earlier; excerpts from the papers of Maurice Wilkins, Linus Pauling, and Rosalind Franklin; and a chapter that had been dropped from the original. After half a century, the implications of the double helix keep rippling outward; the tools of molecular biology have forever transformed the life sciences. The New Annotated and Illustrated Edition of The Double Helix adds a richness to the account of the momentous events that led the charge. The Double Helix is the best book I know about a scientific discovery. This new edition suffuses the whole with social history, fascinating documentation, photography, and cunning background research. The early fifties, the beginning of the modern age of molecular biology, spring to life. Ian McEwan, author of Atonement --