The UK is honoring crystallographer Rosalind Franklin (1920–58) by creating a medal in her name to recognize innovations in science. Franklin’s research was largely ignored during her lifetime, but is now widely accepted as having been key to discovering the structure of DNA. The new medal—the Royal Society’s first to carry a woman’s name—has a purse worth £30 000 (approximately $42 000).
Franklin died four years before the Nobel Prize in Medicine went to Francis H. C. Crick, James D. Watson, and Maurice H. F. Wilkins for the discovery of the structure of DNA. “It has been a long haul to bring Rosalind’s contribution into the light of day,” says the University of Cambridge’s Joan Mason, who has given lectures on Franklin’s research. Watson, now at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York State, agrees: “It’s a great idea, not just honoring a woman, or a crystallographer, but also the...
