Maurice Wilkins

Born

December 15, 1916

Died

October 5, 2004 (aged 87)

Known as

biophysicist, physician, physicist, crystallographer, researcher, author

Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins was a New Zealand-born British biophysicist and Nobel laureate whose research spanned multiple areas of physics and biophysics, contributing to the scientific understanding of phosphorescence, isotope separation, optical microscopy, and X-ray diffraction. He is most noted for initiating and leading early X-ray diffraction studies on DNA at King's College London, and for his pivotal role in enabling the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA.

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