We can’t delude ourselves into thinking that anything we or any other business does is “sustainable”. The best we can do is minimize the harm we do to the planet. We’ll do what we can to clean up our own house and convince other businesses and suppliers to use cleaner energy and more responsible materials, but it’s a never-ending summit. The work is never done.

I'm making cheap electricity,

For a serious writer seriously concerned about any moral, social, political, environmental issues, it is a major concern. I’ve been wrestling with it ever since I was 18.

Well, you know, the genotype. I'll mention something that nobody ever mentions. Let's say you have now a genotype that makes a certain protein. And that protein, and you can see this in every issue of Science practically, that protein is a very complex structure, incredibly complex. Now how that step from a group of amino acids to that polypeptide [happens] is an enormous jump. I think right now everybody leaves it alone because nobody yet has figured out just exactly how to attack this problem.

if you drive yourself to win prizes, I think you will never get it, as you are busy thinking about it. And secondly, this is a bad way of living life.

I wanted to be a physician. And I am a physician, so I fulfilled that dream. I did not know anything about science. I did not know what one was supposed to do in science. I wanted to be a doctor, and I became indeed a doctor.

I always chose to surround myself with good people no matter my career. I picked teachers and mentors who promised me a hard life.

You have to die of something. Let’s say we would be able to cure cancer, or Alzheimer, or cardiovascular diseases. And then what? Should we be young forever or healthy forever?

Science for me is a language of peace and the only one I know which is absolutely international. I can talk to a UK scientist or any scientist worldwide about my research and they understand exactly what I am talking about. We may even find an area of mutual interest to collaborate on and together we can make an even greater impact on the world around us.

The achievement is not the Nobel, the achievement is the science.