American molecular biologist James Dewey Watson, best known for discovering the structure of DNA, has died at the age of 97. New York TimesWatson died Thursday in East Northport, on Long Island, New York.
His son Duncan said My daughter Watson died in hospice, where he was transferred this week from the hospital, where he was being treated for an infection.
Considered one of the most important scientists of the 20th century, Watson and his co-author Francis Crick proposed in a 1953 academic paper in the journal Nature the double helical structure of the DNA molecule.
Nine years later, Watson, Crick, and Maurice Wilkins were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine “for their discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its importance in the transmission of information in living materials.”
Watson was born on April 6, 1928 in Chicago, Illinois, and received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Chicago and his doctorate from Indiana University Bloomington. After a postdoctoral year at the University of Copenhagen, Watson worked at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge in England, where he first met Crick.
In March 1953, Watson and Crick deduced the double helix structure of DNA, changing our understanding of biology forever.
Aside from his contributions to science, Watson was also known for his campaigns for peace. During his tenure at Harvard, Watson participated in a protest against the Vietnam War and led a group of 12 biologists and biochemists calling for the “immediate withdrawal of US forces from Vietnam.”
In 1975, on the 30th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, Watson was one of more than 2,000 scientists and engineers who spoke out against nuclear proliferation, arguing that there was no sure way to safely dispose of radioactive waste, and that nuclear plants posed a security threat because of the potential for plutonium to be stolen by terrorists.
(Tags for translation)James Watson
