Francisco Crick in Paradiso

Francisco Crick in Paradiso

Richard Dawkins has written another book on evolution. I haven't read it, but I noticed that one reviewer thought that the force of Dawkins' arguments was becoming diluted by a combination of militant atheism and over-flamboyant prose. To conservative scientists like me, the idea of selfish genes, while certainly snappy, leads to ignoring the biology surrounding the genes and, in the end, to a ...

Microbial Paradiso

Microbes share with higher organisms many of the fundamental properties of life—genetics, metabolism—and have accomplished more than any other group in terms of solving basic biological and biochemical processes that allow adaptation for life on Earth. John L. Ingraham, former President of the American Society of Microbiologists, and Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis, ha...

Crick Book_newfont.qxp

In Memoriam: Francis H.C. Crick

Quickly I narrowed down my interests to two main areas: the borderline between the living and the nonliving, and the workings of the brain. Further introspection showed me that what these two subjects had in common was that they touched on problems which, in many circles, seemed beyond the power of science to explain. He was fortunate to get a studentship in Max Perutz's group in the Cavendish ...

Francis Crick 1916–2004

In March 1953, 31 years after Howard Carter’s astonishing first glimpse into Tutankhamun's tomb, an even more golden treasure was found. Francis Crick and Jim Watson shared that moment of discovery as they looked, for the first time, into the heart of all living things. They saw the structure of DNA, and their vision became the big bang of modern biology. Francis’ life in research began inauspi...