New book sheds light on the overlooked scientist who discovered DNA
The Dawn Fisherman: Friedrich Miescher and the Discovery of DNA will be published in June.
A new book co-written by a researcher at the University of Leeds’ Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures will reveal the origins of one of the most important discoveries in modern science.
The Dawn Fisherman: Friedrich Miescher and the Discovery of DNA (Springer Nature), by Dr Kersten Hall (Visiting Fellow at the School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science) and Dr Ralf Dahm (Director of Scientific Management at the Institute of Molecular Biology, Mainz, Germany, and the University of Padua, Italy) is the first book to focus on the life and work of Friedrich Miescher, the Swiss scientist who first identified DNA.
The book revisits a figure whose contribution has often been overshadowed by the breakthroughs made by James Watson and Francis Crick in understanding the structure of DNA. But rather than presenting Miescher simply as a precursor to more famous names, Dr Hall and Dr Dahm place him firmly in the intellectual and experimental context of the 19th century.
Drawing on Miescher’s publications and letters, the authors trace his breakthrough – from washing pus off discarded bandages in Tübingen’s medieval castle to fishing salmon in the Rhine at dawn to study their sperm – and follow how his insights were received against a backdrop of intellectual rivalries, clashing egos, and fierce feuds that raged between disciplines.
The book then explores what became of Miescher’s discovery after his death, showing how a molecule long dismissed as biologically insignificant became central to powerful technologies that now shape our future.
Dr Hall and Dr Dahm said:
“Whether it is through forensic crime dramas on TV or movies about theme parks full of cloned dinosaurs, most people have heard of DNA, the genetic material. Much less well known, however, is the name of the researcher who first discovered DNA - a Swiss scientist named Friedrich Miescher whose studies of pus proved to be a landmark in the history of science.
“The Dawn Fisherman puts the spotlight for the first time on Miescher himself and tells the story of his momentous yet overlooked achievement, which was not only technical but conceptual, identifying key properties of the material that makes us who we are.
“Miescher’s story offers a welcome corrective to the heroic tales of maverick geniuses and Eureka moments that hold such a grip on the popular imagination. We show how these kind of narratives actually serve to obscure, rather than illuminate how science unfolds and make our point using an example from the last ten years of how this can have very serious ethical consequences.”
The Dawn Fisherman: Friedrich Miescher and the Discovery of DNA will be published in June.
Dr Hall and Dr Dahm have written a comment piece for The Conversation UK’s Unsung Heroes of Science, published on DNA Day (Saturday 25 April).
