Product Details

• Actors: Nova
• Directors: Nova
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: PBS
• DVD Release Date: April 24, 2007
• Run Time: 56 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000MZGN54
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,542 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

On April 25, 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick published their groundbreaking discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, the molecule essential for passing on our genes and the ''secret of life.'' But their crucial breakthrough depended on the pioneering work of another biologist–Rosalind Franklin. She would never know that Watson and Crick had seen a crucial piece of her data without her permission. This was an X-ray image, ''Photo 51,'' that proved to be a vital clue in their decoding of the double helix.

50 years later, NOVA investigates the shocking truth behind one of the greatest scientific discoveries and presents a moving portrait of a brilliant woman in an era of male-dominated science. Sadly, Franklin never lived to see her vital role in the discovery vindicated. While Watson and Crick went on to win the Nobel Prize in 1962, Franklin died in 1958, at 37, from ovarian cancer; and the Nobel is not awarded posthumously.

Hear the inside story from Maurice Wilkins, the colleague who showed her crucial x-ray to Watson; Raymond Gosling, Franklin’s Ph.D. student with whom she made Photo 51; and Nobel Prize winner Sir Aaron Klug, Franklin’s last collaborator, who shows new evidence of just how close Franklin came to making the vital double helix discovery herself.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars nice overview, March 23, 2009

By 

Joe Clueless (Florida, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: NOVA: DNA - Secret of Photo 51 (DVD)

A good contribution to Franklin's role in this important discovery, a discovery that unleashed molecular genetics. It's too bad that Watson did not respond to Nova's request for an interview (as claimed in the piece). Watson's "The Structure of DNA" was never presented as a history -- it was a personal memoir, filled with impolitic observations that stunned Crick and others involved in the "race." In some ways, Watson has done a service to Franklin, portraying her in such an unflattering and ungenerous way that legions have been motivated to provide a corrective view. Some good objective histories, such as Olby's, provide a bit more balanced assessment. I did not see reference to Sayre's biography of Franklin, which is a good read.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Making It Up to Rosalind, November 14, 2007

By 

Kari L. Rhoades "krho" (North Carolina) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: NOVA: DNA - Secret of Photo 51 (DVD)

This video is very informative, and I would recommend it to those who are interested in the history of one of the landmark discoveries of the last three generations. I did not know anything about x-ray crystallography, and this inspired me to read up on it. In view of James Watson's recent comments, maybe Rosalind Franklin does need some post-mortem defenders...but this video comes off in the vein of "those mean men! They were too stupid to develop their own theory, so they had to climb over a woman to come up with anything meaningful!". Power to Rosalind...may she receive the credit she deserves, but don't make her a victim!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hungry for More Detail, April 7, 2009

By 

R. Sykora (Fremont, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: NOVA: DNA - Secret of Photo 51 (DVD)

"DNA: Secret of Photo 51" covers a lot of ground, but left me hungry for more of the technical details, especially those connecting DNA geometry with the X-ray images. But that's a quibble - - it shows that scientific discovery history isn't always black and white.