25 July 12

X-ray crystallography detects the positions of atoms within crystalline solids. My tie with tiny flecks of cherry-red and silver against a navy background captures the idea of atoms in a lattice, and so I am celebrating the work of Rosalind Franklin, born this day in 1920, as she did the grunt X-ray work behind the discovery of the structure of DNA, often credited only to James Watson and Francis Crick.