Dorothy Hodgkin was an English chemist who determined the structure of penicillin and vitamin B12, for which she won the 1964 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. She also t elucidated the structure of insulin in 1969 after 35 years of work. Her work helped save millions of lives from infection, diabetes and anaemia.
Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin was born in Cairo, Egypt, in 1910. to John and Molly Crowfoot who worked in North Africa and the Middle East in colonial administration and later as archaeologists. She studied chemistry at Somerville College. University of Oxford, She was among the first to study the structure of an organic compound by using X-ray crystallography. She went on to do her doctorate under British physicist John Desmond Bemal at the University of Cambridge. She discovered how x-ray crystallography can be used to determine the structure of vitamin D and stomach enzyme pepsin. Dorothy began teaching at Somerville, one of Oxford’s few colleges for women. There she established an X-ray laboratory and began working on X-ray photographs of insulin. Working with Australian pathologist Howard Florey and his colleagues at Oxford, Dorothy determined the structure of penicillin, describing the arrangement of its atoms in three dimensions. In the mid1950s Hodgkin discovered the structure of vitamin B12. Her structural studies helped scientists understand how molecules carry out their tasks in living systems.
Hodgkin devoted the latter part of her life to the cause of scientists in developing countries such as India and China. She strived for improved East-West relations and disarmament. She served as the president of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Aairs, an organisation that brings together scientists from around the world to discuss peaceful progress towards international security and development.
Picture Credit : Google
