Introduction
Sir Paul Nurse FRS took part in this interview on 04 January 2011 after taking up office as President of the Royal Society in December 2010.
What inspired your interest in science?
As a child, my first stirrings of an interest in science developed simply by looking at the world around me. My curiosity about plants, animals, birds, insects and how they grew connected me directly to biology. However, I was also interested in astronomy and my parents bought me a telescope when I was 11 which enabled me to look at craters on the moon and the rings of Saturn. I have retained an amateur interest in both natural history and astronomy and will be bringing two telescopes with me to the Society at Carlton House Terrace.
Did you have any inspiring science teachers at school?
At secondary school I had a great biology teacher, Mr Keith Neil. He really was quite inspirational and he worked frequently out of hours on experiments and investigations with his pupils. Led by Mr Neil I spent many evenings and weekends working on various projects which involved developing fish and the eye colour in the Drosophila fruit fly. This had a fantastically positive effect on me and I would say that a combination of an interest in the natural world and having great teachers inspired me to pursue a career in science.
What prompted you to pursue your particular area of research?
The main driver for my research was trying to understand some of the basic principles that underline life. I feel it is a real privilege to be a scientist and think that as a scientist you should try and ask really important questions – this led me to consider what life actually is, and to identify one of its basic properties as the ability to reproduce. I realised that the cell is the simplest unit of life and the process of cell division is the basic form of reproduction. Therefore how this is controlled felt like an important biological question. The advantage of studying these processes in yeast is that this organism is good for genetics and if you don’t understand a biological problem, genetics often provides a gateway to better understanding.
A lot of your research is looking at cells of model organisms such as yeast – what can yeast tell us about human cells and how does this lead to new treatments and better understanding of human diseases?
At an early stage in my research I began to think of things that made it more relevant – because cell reproduction is a common property in all living things, I was interested to see if it was actually controlled in the same way for all organisms. Whilst this is accepted now, it wasn’t always and during the 80s I was able to show that basic cell cycle controls are the same from yeast through to humans. Once you come to that conclusion you start to think of disease in humans, and I began to look into how cell cycle control is relevant to understanding cancer. However I’ve never worked directly on cancer myself, my research has resulted in more basic discovery and I’ve left it to others to make it more directly relevant to disease.
What’s the next big thing in your field?
In my own research, I will continue working with yeast to address basic questions about the behaviour of the cell relating to cell cycle and cell shape. I’m setting up a new research group in London and we’ll be asking questions such as: How does a cell have a sense of its own internal dimensions? How does a cell know where its middle is? And how do organelles determine their shape and size? Even though we know a huge amount of detail about these things, we don’t actually have satisfactory answers to these simply stated questions. Now we’re in a position where we can use systems biology, genomics and modelling techniques to help make sense of big questions at a cellular level.
Research is clearly your passion, how will you balance your many commitments such as being President of the Royal Society, amongst others, with sustaining your interest and passion for research?
I’m often asked this. Research is my passion, I’m still an active researcher and spend roughly half my time communicating with my lab and thinking, reading and writing around my research. I do work hard, long hours but I have combined heavy administrative jobs with my own research for the last 15 years. However lab work is what keeps me sane! It also gives me a certain credibility as an advocate for science, as it means I am close to the real issues affecting researchers.
What is your vision for the Royal Society over the next 5 years?
I’m cautious about answering this until I’ve been here longer and know more about the issues and have fully discussed it with my colleagues, the Royal Society’s Council and the Fellowship. This is because the scope for what the Royal Society can achieve is huge and as a result you have to really think about what you can effectively achieve within a period of time. I would like the Royal Society to be effective rather than just symbolic. I also think the Society should have a significant role in communicating science and making it exciting and interesting to the public. This is especially important as society is becoming increasingly dependent on science and technology for its operation, consequently one of the keys to democracy is being properly engaged with science and technology.
Ultimately I see the Royal Society as being the primary advocate for science in the UK combined with a having an important role in protecting the high standards needed for science. This will be the starting point for strategic discussions over the next 6 months.