Crick: A Mind in Motion with Matthew Cobb

Professor Matthew Cobb will be discussing his major new biography of Francis Crick, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, pioneering neuroscientist, and twentieth-century genius.About the speaker
Matthew Cobb is a British zoologist and Emeritus Professor of Zoology at the University of Manchester. He is the author of popular science books, and appeared on BBC Radio 4's The Infinite Monkey Cage, The Life Scientific, Start the Week and The Curious Cases of Rutherford & Fry, as well as on BBC Radio 3 and the BBC World Service.His book Crick: A Mind in Motion from DNA to the Brain, was published in 2025. Exploring the life of Frances Crick the restless, relentless thinker, who was as fascinated by Beat poetry and psychedelics as the genetic meaning of life and the inner workings of the brain. Galvanised by collaboration: with Jim Watson on DNA, with artists in Cambridge and California, and with his wife Odile, who drew the figure of the double helix that illuminated his most famous discovery. It was his debates and conflicts with these collaborators that powered a mind in motion.