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OneLegUpAlex Honors the Work of Watson and Crick and the DNA Discovery as Dr. James Watson Passes at 97 Years old 11-7-25 · OneLegUpAlex Media

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  Speaker 1: Here's your host, Alex Garrett.
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  Speaker 2: In many ways, Watson and Crick were the founding fathers
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  Speaker 2: of those like ancestry dot com in twenty three and
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  Speaker 2: meters because Watson and Crick founded founded the structure of
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  Speaker 2: our DNA.
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  Speaker 1: And what's interesting to me here.
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  Speaker 2: On the one like up network as we here today,
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  Speaker 2: that James Watson, the co founder and co discoverer of
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  Speaker 2: the structure of DNA, has passed away in ninety seven.
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  Speaker 2: It strikes me because I had thought when we were
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  Speaker 2: talking learning about Watson and Crik and the double helix
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  Speaker 2: as kids in science class.
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  Speaker 1: That.
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  Speaker 2: This, uh, these two gentlemen were historical figures, only to
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  Speaker 2: find out today that Watson.
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  Speaker 1: And Crick.
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  Speaker 2: Were around owned up until this millennium. So Francis Kreek
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  Speaker 2: passed away in two thousand and four at eighty eight,
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  Speaker 2: but today, at ninety seven, James Watson has passed away.
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  Speaker 2: Now I understand, while they're both Nobel winners, there were
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  Speaker 2: some things that Watson said where he was stripped of
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  Speaker 2: Nobel Priest prize.
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  Speaker 1: I don't know whatever he said.
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  Speaker 2: We can put that aside because what Watston Creek did
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  Speaker 2: in discovering the structure of the DNA has changed so
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  Speaker 2: many lives and so many people's.
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  Speaker 1: Even fates.
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  Speaker 2: Right, So the in the world of crime, if the
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  Speaker 2: DNA does not match, then the guy or gal is
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  Speaker 2: set free.
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  Speaker 1: If it does match, then they're going to jail.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, what Watson and Crik did goes beyond just
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  Speaker 2: finding the double flix. It's impacted so many lives.
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  Speaker 1: And really the DNA model.
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  Speaker 2: Has been around since just nineteen fifty one when they
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  Speaker 2: first proposed it together.
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  Speaker 1: And as the National Library of Medicine Rights.
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  Speaker 2: The story of Watsonton Creek began with their mediat Cavendish
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  Speaker 2: this is UK, and in November fifty one, Watson attended
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  Speaker 2: a seminar given by Franklin, by which this Franklin would
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  Speaker 2: be and the Franklin they're referring to as Rosalind Franklin, who,
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  Speaker 2: amongst a few others, were in the running and competing
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  Speaker 2: to discover the structure of the DNA.
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  Speaker 1: But here's how they write it.
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  Speaker 2: This Roslyn Franklin was present her X ray diffraction data
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  Speaker 2: indicating the DNA was structured as a helix. Following the seminar,
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  Speaker 2: Watson and Creek presented their first attempt at correcting the
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  Speaker 2: structure of DNA A helix with phosphate and sugar back
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  Speaker 2: bone inside of the helix. And I guess it was
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  Speaker 2: just such a bad attempt that the Covendish Laboratory actually
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  Speaker 2: put a halt to their work for now.
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  Speaker 1: But then, but then.
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  Speaker 2: Thanks to some ethical things where they took data from
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  Speaker 2: this Franklin progress report the megal Research Council in nineteen
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  Speaker 2: fifty two, and then Watson and Crick went off findings
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  Speaker 2: known as the chargraph or targraphs ratios, which is named
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  Speaker 2: after Irwin Chargraph will visit England and learned Watsonton Creek
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  Speaker 2: to his experiments on DNA extracts, which is a little
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  Speaker 2: too wordy here, so I'll just say all of these studies,
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  Speaker 2: all of this data. Eventually they wrote, it has not
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  Speaker 2: escaped our notice that the specific pairing we have postulated
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  Speaker 2: immediately suggests a possible copying mechanism for the genetic material.
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  Speaker 2: Their hypothesis of DNA structure was published in the journal
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  Speaker 2: Nature in nineteen fifty three and the title by Watson
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  Speaker 2: Creek was modest Molecular Structure of nucleic acids A structure
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  Speaker 2: for deoxyribo's nucleic acid, barely suggesting they had solved a
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  Speaker 2: secret of life. For their monumentous finding of the double
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  Speaker 2: helix and the structure of DNA, they shared the nineteen
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  Speaker 2: sixty two Nobel Prize with.
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  Speaker 1: Another player in the game of all this, Maurice Wilkins.
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  Speaker 2: I mean there were a few competitors, as they write,
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  Speaker 2: Watson Krick, Maurice Wilkins, Roslyn Franklin, and Linus Pauling. And
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  Speaker 2: Wilkins was the first investigator to take on the study
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  Speaker 2: of DNA and have been painstacingly working for years at
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  Speaker 2: King's College in London. Franklin was a postdoctoral fellow in
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  Speaker 2: Wilkins's lab. I mean, they all combined with their studies
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  Speaker 2: to discover DNA and the DNA structure. And it's hard
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  Speaker 2: to believe that it's only nineteen sixty two. It doesn't
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  Speaker 2: It feel like we've been talking about this for ages
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  Speaker 2: and ages and ages, and yet that structure has not
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  Speaker 2: only saved lives, because also today's scientists continue to utilize
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  Speaker 2: DNA in such a way that does save lives. That
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  Speaker 2: copying mechanism, that genetic pairing, the.
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  Speaker 1: Even ways to regrow limbs. I mean there are ways
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  Speaker 1: DNA is.
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  Speaker 2: Used today that if all of these players not play
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  Speaker 2: a role, specifically Washington Crick, I don't know where we
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  Speaker 2: would be. I don't think we'd be able to track
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  Speaker 2: our family history like this and nab awful evil people
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  Speaker 2: yet set the right ones free. And that's all because
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  Speaker 2: of this discovery in the nineteen fifties of DNA struck sure,
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  Speaker 2: And now I want to read the double Helix and
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  Speaker 2: get into this a little more because the passing of
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  Speaker 2: James Watson has totally totally piqued my interests.
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  Speaker 1: Again learning about this in high school and elementary school.
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  Speaker 2: You think these figures were historical figures that you know,
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  Speaker 2: we were in high school and elementary school and all
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  Speaker 2: that in the two thousands, just fifty years after the
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  Speaker 2: discovery of the helix, very early on in that endeavor,
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  Speaker 2: and it still feels early on that endeavor because scientists
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  Speaker 2: are still manipulating DNA, still working on how it can
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  Speaker 2: help people save their life in the emergency room, in
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  Speaker 2: the medical field.
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  Speaker 1: And regenerate different DNA strands.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, there are works going on continually to better
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  Speaker 2: people's lives because of this discovery.
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  Speaker 1: That was only made in the nineteen fifties.
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  Speaker 2: Now, that's about seventy five years ago now, But the
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  Speaker 2: point remains, what Watson and Quick set out to do.
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  Speaker 1: In the science field.
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  Speaker 2: Is just incredible, because I'm sure today you can hear
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  Speaker 2: from different people whose lives have been saved from DNA restructuring,
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  Speaker 2: from genetic copying, as they say, And there's even a
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  Speaker 2: website called helix dot com which as of twenty eighteen
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  Speaker 2: says there are six exciting ways the DNA is changing
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  Speaker 2: the world.
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  Speaker 1: DNA can also help us understand.
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  Speaker 2: Communities, different communities, the genetic traits of people disabilities. Because
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  Speaker 2: these group of scientists, though they competed together against each other,
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  Speaker 2: and though Watson and Creek came up with a definitive.
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  Speaker 1: Hypothesis, here has made a mark forever on the world.
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  Speaker 2: And they now write that researchers have the opportunity to
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  Speaker 2: learn about how a personal environment may combine with their
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  Speaker 2: genetics to give rise to specific traits. They want to
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  Speaker 2: sequence ancient DNA to learn about history.
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  Speaker 1: I love to see all this unfold.
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  Speaker 2: Even early cancer can be identified using DNA sequencing technology.
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  Speaker 2: They even say DNA can be a tool against climate
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  Speaker 2: change according to this article, But.
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  Speaker 1: According to helix.
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  Speaker 2: Dot com r gmnome is made up of three point
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  Speaker 2: two billion base pairs which code from more than twenty
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  Speaker 2: thousand different genes, and it all starts with that strand
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  Speaker 2: that double helix, that helix, that discovery by Watson and Krick.
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  Speaker 2: And maybe his passing today because he quick passed away
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  Speaker 2: in twenty oh four at the age of eighty eight
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  Speaker 2: due to colon cancer, but maybe his passing today of
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  Speaker 2: James Watson can bring about again this important discovery that
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  Speaker 2: DNA has truly changed all of our lives in one
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  Speaker 2: way or another, and their discovery, on the passing of
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  Speaker 2: James Watson, I can say their discovery has helped us
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  Speaker 2: have one leg up on understanding each other, on understanding science,
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  Speaker 2: on understanding.
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  Speaker 1: Medicine, and unmoving us forward.
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  Speaker 2: That's what discovering the double helix, the DNA structure has
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  Speaker 2: helped us do.
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  Speaker 1: Has helped us move our society forward.
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  Speaker 2: And the brilliant scientists that now work with DNA are
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  Speaker 2: proving that every single day, starting all the world's digital
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  Speaker 2: data using about a kilogram of DNA.
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  Speaker 1: That's what they say.
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  Speaker 2: So thank you Watson and Kric for your contribution to society,
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  Speaker 2: for your worldview, and for even connecting us to our past,
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  Speaker 2: all by that one double helix strand, that strand of DNA,
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  Speaker 2: taking us a long way as we worked have one
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  Speaker 2: leg up on life.
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  Speaker 1: F