DNA 'key breakthrough by British academics'

THE discovery of DNA is the most important breakthrough made by academics at UK universities, a poll found yesterday.

It was more significant than genetic fingerprinting, the first working computer and the contraceptive pill, according to a survey of some 400 academics.

They were asked to rate discoveries made by their peers in a poll to mark Universities Week.

University of Cambridge scientists James Watson and Francis Crick's discovery in 1953 of the double helix structure of DNA – the genetic code for all living things – was rated the most important, with 27 per cent of the vote.

In second place was genetic fingerprinting, on 13 per cent, followed by the first working computer, credited to two University of Manchester scientists, with 8 per cent. The contraceptive pill, developed in 1961 by Herchel Smith, a researcher at Manchester University, took fourth place, with 6 per cent.