In the second of four interviews Nobel laureate Professor Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin OM FRS (1910-1994) discusses her career in x-ray crystallography from the time of first research studies in Cambridge in 1932 to the point at which she had determined and published the three dimensional structure of penicillin and was turning to interests in vitamin B12 in 1947. She talks first about structural studies of the sterols in JD Bernal's laboratory in Cambridge from 1932-34, then her return to Oxford and work on sterols that preceded wartime studies of penicillin crystals. The technical challenges and collaborative efforts involved in determining the structures of penicillin's sodium, potassium and rubidium salts are then reviewed in depth. The final section of the interview provides an introduction to work on the 3-dimensional structure of vitamin B12, a subject taken up as the central topic of interview III. The interview provides a range of perspectives on penicillin research and life in Oxford in the years of World War II.
x-ray crystallography, 3-dimensional molecular structure of penicillin, vitamin B12 crystals, Somerville College Oxford, penicillin studies in Oxford from 1940-46
Biochemistry,
vid-110, MSVA_037
Permanent link to this resource: https://doi.org/10.24384/000156
Hodgkin, Dorothy CrowfootBlythe, Max
Learning Resources
Original artefact: 1988 RADAR resource: 2017
Oxford, UK
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