"It was Franklin's photographic skills that made the discovery possible.She could take photographs of crystals… and interpret the patterns...a particular genius at aligning hand and mind." - Brenda Maddox on Rosalind Franklin, Author of Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA

(1920-1958) Dr. Rosalind Franklin was a British scientist with notable recognitions, the most famous of which was her X-ray crystallography images of DNA.  Together with James Watson, Francis Crick, and Maurice Wilkins, they discovered the building block of life in 1953.  The three men shared a Nobel Prize in 1962, an award that cannot be claimed posthumously.  Dr. Franklin succumbed to ovarian cancer in 1958 at the young age of 37. 

Sources:  NPR, NIH, and PBS