WHAT do top newspaper columnist Lynda Lee-Potter - who had a home in Dorset - and mass murderer Harold Shipman have in common?

They have both been added to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography - along with broadcasters John Peel and Alistair Cooke and raconteur Sir Peter Ustinov.

The dictionary, published since 1885, describes individuals who have left their mark on British society. The new online edition features 211 men and women, who all died in 2004.

Lynda Lee-Potter died at her home near Wareham in October 2004, aged 69, after suffering from a brain tumour. The writer, who had been with the Daily Mail since 1967, was known for her acerbic wit and often described as "the First Lady of Fleet Street".

Born Lynda Higginson into a Lancashire mining family, she married medical student Jeremy Lee-Potter in 1957. As an RAF doctor he was posted to Aden, where Lynda began her journalistic career, on the Aden Chronicle. Her last piece was an interview with Gloria Hunniford, who spoke for the first time about the death of her daughter, Caron Keating.

The columnist was awarded the OBE in 1998 for her charity work and journalism. Her three children, daughters Charlie and Emma and son Adam, all followed her into journalism. She also left behind four grandchildren.

Shipman, who hanged himself in Wakefield prison in order, it is thought, to protect his wife's pension rights and financial entitlements, has been attributed by an official public inquiry to 215 murders and 45 other suspicious deaths.

The dictionary says that "it may be said" the GP had "a superiority complex", adding, "he wanted to feel omnipotent, realised that the ultimate power is that of deciding life and death, and made himself Britain's most prolific serial killer out of vanity."

He joins other infamous murderers like Jack the Ripper and Myra Hindley in the online publication.

Dictionary editor Dr Lawrence Goldman said of the decision to include Shipman: "The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (DNB) is not a roll-call of the great and good' but a record of those who left a mark on any aspect of British history, for good or ill.

"The DNB has always included criminals, particularly those whose crimes led to sustained public interest and debate about legal or medical issues, as in the case of Harold Shipman.

"Not only was Shipman a heinous mass murderer but the nature of his crimes led to a public inquiry and to intense discussion on the relationship between doctor and patient."

Scientists added to the dictionary include Francis Crick, who co-discovered the structure of DNA; Godfrey Hounsfield, who invented the CT scanner; and Norman Heatley, a key figure in the development of penicillin.

Physician Katharina Dalton is a new entry after coining the term pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS) in 1953. Her research at the all-women Holloway Prison found that 49 per cent of newly-committed prisoners had been sentenced for crimes committed in the four days before or during menstruation.

Entries from the world of sport include football manager Brian Clough and Welsh player John Charles.

Among the broadcasters and journalists are Fred Dibnah, Britain's most famous steeplejack, campaigning journalist Paul Foot, as well as Radio 1 DJ Peel and Letter From America host Cooke.

Public figures include Princess Diana's mother Frances Shand Kydd, who was estranged from her daughter when she died in the Paris crash in 1997.

Dramatist Jack Rosenthal, an early writer on Coronation Street whose stage and TV hits also included London's Burning and Bar Mitzvah Boy, also has an entry.

Margaret Kelly, best known as Bluebell, leader of the Parisian Bluebell Girls, and Vernon Bell, credited with introducing karate to Britain in the 1950s, also get a place in the new online edition.

Published by Oxford University Press, the Oxford DNB is updated online three times a year.

The dictionary has been online since 2004, when the publication, once a Victorian institution, was relaunched.