Jack David Dunitz (born 29 March 1923, Glasgow) is a British chemist and one of the greatest chemical crystallographers.
He was Professor of Chemical Crystallography at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Zürich, 1957–90. Currently, he is associated to the research group of Professor François Diederich at the ETH.
Education: Hillhead High School, Glasgow; Hutchesons' Grammar School, Glasgow; University of Glasgow (BSc, PhD).
Together with Sydney Brenner, Dorothy Hodgkin, Leslie Orgel, and Beryl M. Oughton he was one of the first people in April 1953 to see the model of the structure of DNA, constructed by Francis Crick and James Watson; at the time he and the other scientists were working at Oxford University's Chemistry Department. All were impressed by the new DNA model, especially Brenner who subsequently worked with Crick.[1]
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1974, and authored several papers about Linus Pauling.[2][3]
He determined the angle of nucleophilic attack on a carbonyl group. (See Bürgi–Dunitz angle)