Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins (15 December 1916 – 5 October 2004) was a New Zealand-born British biophysicist and Nobel laureate whose research spanned multiple areas of physics and biophysics, contributing to the scientific understanding of phosphorescence, isotope separation, optical microscopy, and X-ray diffraction. He is most noted for initiating and leading early X-ray diffraction studies on DNA at King's College London, and for his pivotal role in enabling the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA.
Wilkins began investigating nucleic acids in 1948. By 1950, he and his team had produced some of the first high-quality X-ray diffraction images of DNA fibers. He presented this work in 1951 at a conference in Naples, where it significantly influenced James Watson, prompting Watson to pursue DNA structure research with Francis Crick.Wilkins, M.H.F. (2003). The Third Man of the Double Helix. Oxford University Press.Watson, J.D. (1968). The Double Helix. Atheneum.
In 1951, Rosalind Franklin joined King’s College and was assigned to the same DNA project, though without a clear delineation of leadership. Tensions developed due to overlapping roles and lack of administrative clarity. During this period, Franklin and graduate student Raymond Gosling captured the high-resolution Photo 51, a diffraction image of B-form DNA. In early 1953, John Randall instructed Gosling to hand it over to Wilkins. Wilkins, in turn, showed it to Watson—without Franklin's consent. This action has been the subject of significant ethical and historiographical debate.Maddox, Brenda (2002). Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA. HarperCollins.Watson, James D. (2012). The Annotated and Illustrated Double Helix. Touchstone. p. 182.
Using insights from Photo 51 and prior data—including Wilkins' own diffraction studies—Watson and Crick constructed their double helix model in March 1953. Wilkins simultaneously continued experimental validation, producing confirmatory diffraction images published in the same issue of Nature.
Wilkins' contributions were not limited to verification. He had led the DNA diffraction research at King’s before Franklin’s arrival,Wilkins, M.H.F. (2003). The Third Man of the Double Helix. Oxford University Press. pp. 56–63. initiated the methods that led to Photo 51,Judson, H.F. (1996). The Eighth Day of Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Biology. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press. pp. 156–159. and played a central role in sharing data and coordinating the laboratory’s DNA efforts—roles often underrepresented in historical summaries.Maddox, B. (2002). Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA. HarperCollins. pp. 175–182.
In later years, Wilkins extended his studies to RNA structureWilkins, M.H.F., Stokes, A.R., & Wilson, H.R. (1958). "Molecular structure of ribonucleic acids: orientation of the bases." Nature 182, 532–535. doi:10.1038/182532a0 and worked on the biological effects of radiation.Wilkins, M.H.F. (1970). "The Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation." In: Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 63(6), 577–582.
He shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Watson and Crick, awarded "for their discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material". Although Franklin had died in 1958 and was therefore ineligible, Wilkins acknowledged her work in his writings and interviews.
In 2000, King's College London named one of its science buildings the Franklin-Wilkins Building to honor their contributions; of note, Wilkins had insisted that Franklin's name be put first. Scholarly reassessments in recent decades have increasingly recognized Wilkins’ role as foundational to the DNA discovery effort.
Early life and education
Wilkins was born in Pongaroa, New Zealand, where his father, Edgar Henry Wilkins, was a medical doctor. His older sister was the translator and poet Eithne Wilkins. His family had come from Dublin, where his paternal and maternal grandfathers were, respectively, Headmaster of Dublin High School and a Chief of Police. The Wilkinses moved to Birmingham, England when Maurice was 6. Later, he attended Wylde Green College and then went to King Edward's School, Birmingham from 1929 to 1935.Student record cards held at King Edward VI Foundation Archive, ref KES/C/3, https://kevi.epexio.com/records/KES/C/3.
Wilkins went to St John's College, Cambridge in 1935; he studied the Natural Sciences Tripos, specialising in Physics, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1938. Mark Oliphant, who was one of Wilkins' instructors at St. John's, had been appointed to the Chair of Physics at the University of Birmingham, and had appointed John Randall to his staff. Wilkins became a PhD student of Randall at the University of Birmingham. In 1945, they published four papers in the Proceedings of the Royal Society on phosphorescence and electron traps. Wilkins received a PhD for this work in 1940.Wilkins, p 68
Career and research Post war years: 1945–1950 During World War II Wilkins developed improved radar screens at Birmingham, then worked on isotope separation at the Manhattan Project at the University of California, Berkeley during the years 1944–45.
Meanwhile, Randall had been appointed to the Chair of Physics at the University of St Andrews. In 1945, he appointed Wilkins as Assistant Lecturer in his department at the University of St Andrews. Randall was negotiating with the Medical Research Council (MRC) to set up a laboratory to apply the experimental methods of physics to problems of biology. The combination of these disciplines as biophysics was a novel idea. The MRC told Randall that this had to be done in another university. In 1946 Randall was appointed Wheatstone Professor of Physics, in charge of the entire Physics department at King's College, London, with the funding to set up a Biophysics Unit. He brought Wilkins with him as Assistant Director of the unit. They appointed a team of scientists trained in both the physical and biological sciences. The "management philosophy" was to explore the use of many techniques in parallel, to find which looked promising, and then to focus on these. Wilkins, as the scientist with most diverse experience of physics and Assistant Director of the unit, had general oversight of the varied projects besides direct involvement in his personal research projects that included new types of optical microscopy.Wilkins, Ch 5 King's College received funding to build completely new Physics and Engineering Departments where vaults beneath the Strand level College forecourt had been destroyed by bombs during the War. The Biophysics Unit, several more experimental physics groups and the theoretical group started to move in, during the early months of 1952. The laboratories were opened formally by Lord Cherwell on 27 June. Wilkins' article for Nature described both departments, consistent with his leadership role and prestige within the college at large.
DNA – Phase One
At King's College, Wilkins pursued, among other things, X-ray diffraction work on ram sperm and DNA that had been obtained from calf thymus by the Swiss scientist Rudolf Signer. The DNA from Signer's lab was much more intact than the DNA which had previously been isolated. Wilkins discovered that it was possible to produce thin threads from this concentrated DNA solution that contained highly ordered arrays of DNA suitable for the production of X-ray diffraction patterns.Wilkins, Maurice HF, 'The Molecular Configuration of Nucleic Acids'. 1962 Nobel lecture, 11 December 1962 Using a carefully bundled group of these DNA threads and keeping them hydrated, Wilkins and a graduate student Raymond Gosling obtained X-ray photographs of DNA that showed that the long, thin DNA molecule in the sample from Signer had a regular, crystal-like structure in these threads. Gosling later said "When... I first saw all those discrete diffraction spots ...emerging on the film in the developing dish was a truly eureka moment....we realised that if DNA was the gene material then we had just shown that genes could crystallize!James D. Watson, The Annotated and Illustrated Double Helix p25" This initial X-ray diffraction work at King's College was done in May or June 1950. It was one of the X-ray diffraction photographs taken in 1950, shown at a meeting in Naples a year later, that sparked James Watson's interest in DNAWilkins, p 138 causing him to write "suddenly I was excited about chemistry.....I began to wonder whether it would be possible for me to join Wilkins in working on DNA".James D. Watson, The Annotated and Illustrated Double Helix p25-26 At that time Wilkins also introduced Francis Crick to the importance of DNA. Crick advised him to work on proteins telling Wilkins "what you ought to do is find yourself a good protein".Robert Olby; "The Path to The Double Helix: Discovery of DNA"; p354 Wilkins knew that proper experiments on the threads of purified DNA would require better X-ray equipment. Wilkins ordered a new X-ray tube and a new microcamera. He also suggested to Randall that the soon-to-be-appointed Rosalind Franklin should be reassigned from work on protein solutions to join the DNA effort.Wilkins, p 128
By the summer of 1950 Randall had arranged for a three-year research fellowship that would fund Rosalind Franklin in his laboratory. Franklin was delayed in finishing her work in Paris. Late in 1950, Randall wrote to Franklin to inform her that rather than work on protein, she should take advantage of Wilkins's preliminary workWilkins pp 144–145 and that she should do X-ray studies of DNA fibers made from Signer's samples of DNA.
DNA Phase two 1951–52
Early in 1951 Franklin finally arrived. Wilkins was away on holiday and missed an initial meeting at which Raymond Gosling stood in for him along with Alex Stokes, who, like Crick, would solve the basic mathematics that make possible a general theory of how helical structures diffract X-rays. No work had been done on DNA in the laboratory for several months; the new X-ray tube sat unused, waiting for Franklin. Franklin ended up with the DNA from Signer, Gosling became her PhD student, and she had the expectation that DNA X-ray diffraction work was her project. Wilkins returned to the laboratory expecting, on the other hand, that Franklin would be his collaborator and that they would work together on the DNA project that he had started. The confusion over Franklin's and Wilkins' roles in relation to the DNA effort (which later developed into considerable tension between them) is clearly attributable to Randall. In his letter of appointment he told Franklin "as far as the experimental X-ray effort [on DNA] is concerned, there will be at the moment only yourself and Gosling".Wilkins, p 145 However, Randall never informed Wilkins of his decision to give Franklin sole responsibility for the DNA effort and Wilkins only learned of the letter years after Franklin's death. He later wrote "My opinion is very clear: that Randall was very wrong to have written to Rosalind telling her that Stokes and I wished to stop our work on DNA, without consulting us. After Raymond [Gosling] and I got a clear crystalline X-ray pattern I was very eager to continue that work ... Trying to understand 'what really happened' when a very admirable scientist [Randall] models himself on Napoleon is not easy ... [but the letter] was very damaging to her and to me".Wilkins, p 143–150