Maurice Wilkins
Most New Zealanders know that Nelson-born Ernest Rutherford won a Nobel Prize for splitting the atom. Less well known is the fact that a man born in rural Wairarapa shared a 1962 Nobel Prize for an equally pivotal scientific breakthrough: the discovery of the structure of DNA. In 2003, the 50th anniversary of that discovery was celebrated—with Maurice Wilkins taking a share of the limelight.