James D. Watson, whose co-discovery of the twisted-ladder structure of DNA in 1953 helped light the long fuse on a revolution in medicine, crimefighting, genealogy and ethics, has died, according to his former research lab. He was 97.
The breakthrough — made when the brash, Chicago-born Watson was just 24 — turned him into a hallowed figure in the world of science for decades. But later in life, he faced condemnation and professional censure for offensive remarks.
Watson shared a 1962 Nobel Prize with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins for discovering that deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, is a double helix, consisting of two strands that coil around each other to create what resembles a long, gently twisting ladder.
In 2014, he became the first living prizewinner to auction off their medal, though the purchaser returned the award to him several months later.
The breakthrough discovery suggested how hereditary information is stored and how cells duplicate their DNA when they divide. The duplication begins with the two strands of DNA pulling apart like a zipper. Even among non-scientists, the double helix would become an instantly recognized symbol of science, showing up in such places as the work of Salvador Dali and a British postage stamp.
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The findings, based on data from Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin and other colleagues at King’s College London, were a “pivotal moment in the life sciences,” said the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in Long Island.
Watson spent much of his career at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, becoming its director in 1968 and focusing the facility’s research on DNA viruses that cause cancer. Watson, his wife and their two children lived on the laboratory’s grounds for decades.
“Watson’s extraordinary contributions to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory during his long tenure transformed a small, but important laboratory on the North Shore of Long Island into one of the world’s leading research institutes,” the institution said.
Watson continued to make scientific discoveries. While at Cambridge in England, he carried out pioneering research on the structure of small viruses, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory said. He also helped demonstrate the existence of mRNA in his lab at Harvard University in partnership with researchers at Cambridge, and later discovered important bacterial proteins that control gene expression, the laboratory said. He also wrote influential textbooks and a best-selling memoir, mentored young scientists and guided the early years of the Human Genome Project.
Watson gained unwelcome attention in 2007, when London’s Sunday Times Magazine quoted him as saying he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours — where all the testing says not really.” He said that while he hopes everyone is equal, “people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true.”
Watson apologized for the remarks after international uproar and was suspended from his job as chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and retired a week later.
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In a television documentary that aired in early 2019, Watson was asked if his views had changed. “No, not at all,” he said. In response, the Cold Spring Harbor lab revoked several honorary titles it had given Watson, saying his statements were “reprehensible” and “unsupported by science.”
Watson’s combination of scientific achievement and controversial remarks created a complicated legacy.
He has shown “a regrettable tendency toward inflammatory and offensive remarks, especially late in his career,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, said in 2019. “His outbursts, particularly when they reflected on race, were both profoundly misguided and deeply hurtful. I only wish that Jim’s views on society and humanity could have matched his brilliant scientific insights.”
Watson’s DNA discovery helped open the door to more recent developments such as tinkering with the genetic makeup of living things, treating disease by inserting genes into patients, identifying human remains and criminal suspects from DNA samples and tracing family trees. But it has also raised a host of ethical questions, such as whether we should be altering the body’s blueprint for cosmetic reasons or in a way that is transmitted to a person’s offspring.
“Francis Crick and I made the discovery of the century, that was pretty clear,” Watson once said. He later wrote: “There was no way we could have foreseen the explosive impact of the double helix on science and society.”
