The men behind the beautiful minds
October 31, 2009
Megan Ogilvie
HEALTH REPORTER
Between the main course and dessert, the luncheon was declared the biggest gathering of the best scientific minds ever to sit under one roof.
On Friday, seated at long tables at Massey College, 13 Nobel laureates, dozens of past Gairdner Award winners and Toronto's scientific luminaries met for lunch as part of the Gairdner Foundation's 50th anniversary celebrations.
Stem cell scientists, cancer researchers, experts in aging and cell biologists from around the world sat side-by-side, slurping soup and sipping wine.
Talk, of course, was thick with science.
But there were also a lot of 'how are yous?' and "it's been ages," and other convivial backslapping between old friends and former colleagues.
Even though many of the researchers have left the lab bench to lead institutions or go on the speaking circuit, it was clear they all – even the octogenarians – wanted to keep their hands in. There are, they said, many problems left to solve.
Nobel laureates are like us, sort of.
They are largely amiable, generally humble and most still express a little shock that they are considered the world's best.
They also read Voltaire for fun, pick up the New York Times Book Review for a little light reading for the airplane, and spend their spare time thinking about biology's biggest problems – and often finding answers.
The Star grabbed five minutes with four Nobel laureates to catch a glimpse of the person behind the scientist.
DAVID BALTIMORE
The U.S. researcher was awarded the Nobel Prize
in Medicine in 1975 for his discovery of an enzyme, reverse
transcriptase, that can make a copy of DNA from RNA.
As a Nobel laureate, you are assumed to be one of the smartest people in the world. Is this true?
That
is the general belief. Within our particular sciences, we are among the
most successful people. But success is different than smart. I know
some Nobel laureates who are not necessarily particularly smart, but
they are plugged in. They know just the right thing to be doing to get
to a scientific answer. And they found very important things.
When you are not working, what do you enjoy doing most?
Fly fishing.
Is there one particular scientific insight you would like to see made before you die?
There
is one question left in biology which can't be formulated. It's so
deep. And I would love to live long enough to know something about the
answer to it. And that is: What is consciousness? Where does
consciousness come from? What is the substrate of consciousness? How do
you translate from matter into thought into the visual images in your
head?
SYDNEY BRENNER
One of the past century's leading pioneers in genetics and
molecular biology, Brenner, who shared the 2002 Nobel Prize in
Medicine, is best known for discovering the existence of messenger RNA.
You are a great reader. Do you have a favourite book?
There is a book I read almost annually because I think it is the most amusing book of all times. It's a book called Dead Souls,
and it's by a great Russian writer called Nikolai Gogol who was a bit
crazy because he burned half the manuscript. But it's a wonderful book
and contains tremendously interesting insights into people's behaviour.
What is your greatest love?
I think the greatest passion is to solve a problem. ..There is nothing to touch it.
Is there one problem you'd like to see solved before you die?
The
problem I think we can now do, and which I think will be the most
exciting of this century, is to reconstruct the past. To find what
there is in the genome that can tell us about what things were like at
the beginning – like cosmology did in the last century – to find out
what happened when we started as fish and became something else.
PETER C. DOHERTY
The Australian immunologist shared the 1996 Nobel Prize in
Medicine for discovering how the human immune system can identify
virus-infected cells.
As a Nobel laureate, you are considered one of the smartest people in the world. What are you not smart at?
Anything
to do with money. Saying no to invitations; I travel too much. I'm not
smart at writing novels; I've just tried to write one and it's pretty
awful. ..I left my topcoat on the airplane on the way across, so I'm
not smart at keeping topcoats. I had to buy this one from Sears.
How do you pass the time en route from place to place?
I sometimes read novels, sometimes serious ones, sometimes bad ones.
If you could have a beer with three other famous people, who would they be?
Luciano Pavarotti, I suppose. Charles Darwin; he was a bit miserable ... Voltaire. ..Can we go beyond three?
Of course.
Madame
de Pompadour. That would be very strange, wouldn't it, because they
were so different and lived in such a different time. And Jane Austen.
HARALD ZUR HAUSEN
The German cancer researcher was awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in
Medicine for showing that DNA from the human papillomavirus could be
found in cervical cancer tumours. His research helped pave the way for
the HPV vaccine.
When you are not in the lab, what do you enjoy doing most?
Reading.
I read a number of books on philosophical questions – evolution, the
evolution of human behaviour. And listening to classical music.
What CD do you have in your player right now?
Most likely a CD of Mozart.
You won the Nobel Prize just last year. What was your reaction when you got the call from Switzerland?
I
was extremely delighted and pleased. My first reaction was to call my
wife. She was on a plane which was supposed to be starting in Frankfurt
for Buenos Aires. She hadn't switched off her cellphone yet. When I
called, the steward came and wanted to take it out of her hands because
the plane was already starting. She said, "But my husband just won the
Nobel Prize!" So she was allowed to keep the phone.
Toronto Star