Raymond Gosling

Raymond Gosling (15 July 1926 – 18 May 2015) was a British biophysicist. He was known for doing X-ray diffraction studies on DNA. These studies were the first step in understanding the 3-D structure of DNA. He did these studies as a doctoral student in the research group headed by Maurice Wilkins at Kings College London.

Gosling's first supervisor was A.R. Stokes of the Physics Department. By 1950, Gosling's diffraction photographs were described by Wilkins at the time as "much better than Astbury's, and almost like single crystals".Wilkins M.H.F. 1950. Letter to Markham, 15 June 1950, quoted in Olby, Robert 1974. The path to the  double helix. Seattle: Unversity of Washington Prss, 333/4. 

Gosling was re-assigned to Rosalind Franklin when she joined Wilkins' group in 1951. For the next two years, they worked closely together to improve the X-ray diffraction photography of DNA and get a sharper image. Gosling made the X-ray diffraction image of DNA known as "Photo 51". This work led directly to the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine being awarded to Francis Crick, James D. Watson and Maurice Wilkins. Gosling was the co-author with Franklin of one of the three DNA double helix papers published in Nature in April 1953.

Gosling died in London at 88 on 18 May 2015.Professor Raymond Gosling

References

Other websites
 Detailed interview 2013 in Genome Biology 
 Raymond Gosling in The King's story 
 Doppler-shifted ultrasound units (1974-1981) jointly developed by Dr.B.A.Coghlan and Prof.R.G.Gosling's Blood Flow Group at the Physics Dept., Guy's Hospital Medical School, London. These early devices were used for haemodynamic assessment of normal volunteers and assessment of patients with peripheral vascular disease. The work reflects a close and extensive collaboration with Dr.M.G.Taylor.

Category:1926 births
Category:2015 deaths
Category:British physicists