The double helix

By elucidating the structure of DNA, the molecule of life, Francis Crick and James Watson revolutionised biochemistry - and won themselves a Nobel Prize. At the time Watson was only twenty-four, a brilliant zoologist with more interest in au pair girls than in chemistry. His uncompromising honest account of those heady days lifts the lid on the real world of great scientists, with their very human faults and foibles, their petty rivalries and driving ambition. Above all, he captures the extraordinary excitement of their desperate efforts to beat Linus Pauling ('America's fabulous chemist') to the solution to one of the great enigmas of the life sciences. This new edition features an introduction by geneticist Steve Jones in which he re-examines the achievement of Crick and Watson in the light of scientific discoveries before and since their work on the double helix.