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American molecular biologist James Dewey Watson, most noted for his discovery of the structure of DNA has died at the age of 97. According to The New York TimesWatson died on Thursday in East Northport, on Long Island, New York.
His son Duncan told NTY that Watson died in a hospice, where he was moved this week, from a 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 In a 1953 academic paper in Nature, proposed the double helix 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 significance for information transfer in living material”.
Born on April 6, 1928, in Chicago, Illinois, Watson earned his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Chicago and a PhD from Indiana University Bloomington. Following a post-doctoral year at the University of Copenhagen, Watson worked at the University of Cambridge’s Cavendish Laboratory in England, where he first met Crick.
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In March 1953, Watson and Crick deduced the double helix structure of DNA, changing our understanding of biology forever.
Apart 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 thirtieth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, Watson was one of over 2,000 scientists and engineers who spoke out against nuclear proliferation, arguing that there was no proven method for the safe disposal of radioactive waste, and that nuclear plants were a security threat due to the possibility of terrorist theft of plutonium.
