Editing Max Perutz (section)

===DNA structure and Rosalind Franklin===
[[File:Max Perutz with wife 1962.jpg|thumb|Perutz with his wife Gisela at the 1962 Nobel ball]]
During the early 1950s, while Watson and Crick were trying to determine the structure of [[deoxyribonucleic acid]] (DNA), they were given by Perutz an unpublished 1952 progress report for the [[King's College London|King's College]] laboratory of [[John Randall (physicist)|Sir John Randall]]. This report contained [[X-ray diffraction]] images taken by [[Rosalind Franklin]] that proved to be crucial in coming to the double-helix structure.

Perutz did this without Franklin's knowledge or permission, and before she had a chance to publish a detailed analysis of the content of her unpublished progress report. Later this action was criticised by Randall and others, in view of the results and the honours resulting from this "gift".

In an effort to clarify this issue, Perutz later published the report, arguing that it included nothing that Franklin had not said in a talk she gave in late 1951, which Watson had attended. Perutz also added that the report was addressed to an MRC committee created to "establish contact between the different groups of people working for the Council". Randall's and Perutz's labs were both funded by the MRC.