Lindau—memories to last a lifetime

I tried to blog while in Lindau, I really did.  But functioning on at most 6 hours of sleep per day, I just could not allocate any time to blogging. 

Now that the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting is over, I can finally sit still for a moment and reflect on the experience.  And where do I begin?  The whole week felt like a dream.  Hanging out with 60 Nobel laureates and 600 young researchers on a beautiful medieval island over looking Lake Constance—pinch me, is this for real?

Nobel laureates, having reached the pinnacle of success, are treated like celebrities in the scientific community.  Needless to say, it’s interesting to meet them in person and realize that they, too, are humans with diverse backgrounds, personalities, and yes, hobbies.  Many of the laureates are still active in scientific research, although some have switched topics of studies or even fields.  A few laureates have moved onto other career options as educators and advocates.  During conversations with the laureates, I am surprise by how humble many of them are.  Winning the Nobel prize is a REALLLY BIG deal, yet they talk to us like colleagues and show genuine interest in what we have to say.

So what does it take to win the Nobel prize?  From what I’ve heard, luck does play a part.  Being in the right place at the right time helps.  But luck alone is not enough.  Chance favors the prepared mind.  Hard work, innovation, persistence, collaboration with collegaues, and passion for science are important factors too. 

Many of the lectures are available at lindau.nature.com, so I won’t go into the details of each talk.  Instead I will list my favorite moments, in chronological order:

Day 1:

• Meeting Dr. Jack Szostak (2009 physiology or medicine), and discussing his work on the Double Strand Break Repair (DSBR) model of meiotic recombination.  Dr. Szostak and my former PI, Dr. Franklin Stahl, co-authored the paper on the canonical DSBR model.  I read this paper many times during my undergraduate research days, and I finally meet the other author!  Dr. Szostak recalls spending the “most intense” weekend in Frank’s house in Eugene writing that paper, followed by some great skiing.  Work hard, play hard, right?
• Meeting Dr. Hamilton Smith (1978 physiology or medicine), who headed the project on the first synthetic cell (synthetic genome capable of driving self-replication, to be more precise) at the J. Craig Venter Institute.  When this paper came out in Science Magazine a few weeks ago, I was so excited that I posted the link on my facebook status.  And I finally get to ask him how they chose which 14 genes to omit.  The answer: it was random.
• At dinner, I am flanked by two Nobel laureates, Sir Harold Kroto (1996 chemistry) to my left, and Dr. Leland Hartwell (2001 physiology or medicine) to my right.  When does that EVER happen??! 
• The Bavarian polonaise dance: boys and girls line up, pair off, and dance slightly awkwardly…high school much?  It was quite intimidating at first, but I think Sergei, my dance partner, and I manage to do ok.  See the awkwardness for yourself here.
• The dance party continues after the polonaise.  I ask Dr. Agre for a dance, and he graciously agrees.  He is a great dancer, even though his last dance class took place in Reed Hall, when he was a student at Hopkins.  Clearly I’ve missed these lessons at Reed, as I step on his feet… twice. 

Day 2:

• Dr. Roger Tsien’s (2008 chemistry) talk, where he mentions that his group went on Crayola’s website to seek inspirations on naming of their fluorescent proteins.  I’ve worked with tdTomato in one of my graduate school rotation projects, and now I finally know where the name came from… a crayon, imagine that!
• Lunch with Dr. Peter Agre (2003 chemistry), and talking about marathons.  How many scientists-runners have you met?

• Asking Sir Tim Hunt (2001 physiology or medicine) for an autograph (so I’m a science groupie, please don’t judge me), and he draws me the cell cycle!
• Sir Harold Kroto’s talk, where he challenges young researchers to embrace modern technologies and take on a more active role in communication of science.  He also speaks of sustainability and environmental conservation issues—a frequently seen theme at this year’s meeting.  This was one of my favorite sessions.  It’s inspiring to see a world-class scientist becoming a social activist and making his voice heard.
• At the grill & chill dinner, we eat 3 different types of steaks and 2 types of sausages, and consume a large quantity of beer.  There is no bad beer in Germany.  Can you tell that my face is getting rounder?  I’ve probably gained at least 10 pounds by now, and it’s completely worth it. 

Day 3:

• Dr. Oliver Smithies (2007 physiology or medicine), who takes us on a journey of his scientific career by showing pages from his notebooks.  At age 85, he still does bench work and even makes his own buffers!  Here’s the page where he recorded that gene-targeting by homologous recombination works.  My PhD thesis, knock-in of oncogenic mutations in breast epithelial cells, uses a method based on his work.  How cool!!

• At Dr. Richard Ernst’s (1991 chemistry) discussion session, he challenges us to think more of mankind and less of ourselves in order to achieve energy sustainability.  This idea was met with some controversy from the audience.  Several students bring up that it’s human nature to be selfish—from a biological standpoint, we are born to be this way for survival.  So we will never have a world full of Mother Theresas and Gandhis.  I am reminded of the US pharmaceutical industry, where drug companies’ primary goal lies in profits, but in the process, conduct useful research and create new therapies.  I ask Dr. Ernst for his opinion on such situations, and he agrees that there are large ethical gray areas.  The key is to strike a balance between greed and altruism, and realize that as citizens of the world, we share the responsibility to preserve our Earth not only for current residents, but also future inhabitants.
• An evening concert featuring young musicians from all over the world.  Ok, the Stadtheater was a bit too warm, but the music was fantastic.  After dinner, we visit the beergarden again.  When in Germany, do as the Germans do!

Day 4:

• The morning talks in chemistry and physics are out of my league.  They are intriguing but I don’t understand much.  But then one physics talk presents fascinating biomedical applications.  I’m keeping this a secret for now, as it will likely be a part of my presentation at the upcoming Park Lab retreat.
• During lunch with Bosch Fellows who are going to ESOF, I speak fondly of my recent trip to Paris, only to scoffed at by a German guy: “Ugh, Paris smells like urine.”  Clearly, Germans have high standards for cleanliness.
• Dr. Agre gives a fascinating presentation of how he first got involved in basic science research and in more recent years, public health research.  And the link between these two seemingly unrelated fields? Aquaporin, of course.  After his talk, we, the Bmore crew, go to the podium to say goodbye (until we meet again in Torino).  His parting advice to me: “be careful in Italy, Grace, you can’t trust those Italian men.”   
• Sending books back to the US at Deutsche Post was definitely the low point of the week.  Germany achieves total perfection in every aspect, except their post office.  Long story short, we successfully ship out two boxes before the day is over.

• Fantastic Bavarian dinner.  There is music, dance performance, great food and beer, pretzels the size of my head, and most importantly, just before dinner I rescue a monkey, appropriately named Affee (German for monkey):

With that, our stay in Lindau comes to an end.  The meeting goes on for one more day at the island of Mainau, but early Friday morning, we say goodbye to Lindau.  What a whirlwind it’s been.  We come together to celebrate some of the greatest scientific discoveries, and in the process, establish friendships all across the globe.  To my surprise, inspiration comes from not only the laureates, but also my fellow scientists-in-training.  I asked a young chemist why he chose a career in science, and he says: “because I’m curious, I want to know more about the world around me.”  Indeed, curiosity is what led many of us to this business and continues to drive us.  It is a privilege to have the opportunity to discover truths through scientific methods, and advance the world with our knowledge.  I hope I always remember that, particularly on those awful days when every experiment seems to go awry.  Farewell Lindau, I am forever grateful for this experience.