Childhood idea led to inventions

At 88, Prof Oliver Smithies was hale, hearty and witty. His rather carping remarks during the course of a lecture at the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology in Hyderabad on Monday, threw a well-attended scholarly gathering into laughter on many occasions. His topic- Where do ideas come from?- was indeed his journey into the frontiers of science, but his narration made it very lively and made people sit through the one hour long lecture and enjoy. His observation was that those who had a fantastic childhood will come up very well in life.

“I hail from a small village called Copley having a population of just 1500 in Yorkshire. A river passes through our village and we used to sit and play on the bank for hours together. The ambience was very much inspiring and propped up creative thoughts. I had very good teachers- Oddy Brown and Ad Phoenix who taught me basics in mathematics and chemistry. When you have good teachers who have the ability to inspire, naturally good products (good students) would come out.

At least three Nobel Laureates hailed from my native which speaks the ability of our teachers. Even at the college, my guru- Alexander Sandy Ogston of Balliol College- who played very significant role in carving out my career- used to ask us to write an essay on a topic every week and discussed the content of our article. Naturally, such teachers help us grow tall in life” Oliver recalled.

Stating that several aspects of daily life helped him during his research and eventual discovery of principles for introducing specific gene modifications in mice by the use of embryonic stem cells, he said- ‘one day I saw that starch was being used to cleanse the sweat stains around the collar. It was then I used starch as a medium for gel electrophoresis in 1955 and it gave splendid results. It was an idea from my childhood” he revealed.

On PhDs, he made an interesting observation. “PhDs are not just what you discover but what you learnt during the period. It will make you enjoy every day” he remarked.

Advising that one can overcome fear with the acquiring knowledge, Oliver Smithies overwhelmed the audience by presenting some slides showing his preparatory and planning notes from the early 1950s, at a time when there was no advanced equipment or research techniques.