AP Features, December 6th, 2007
One of this year's Nobel Prize winners said Thursday it takes "happy genes" for scientists to succeed despite failed experiments and revealed he once tried to make a telephone from a pig's bladder.
"One has to be an optimist in science because most of the time it doesn't work," U.S. professor Oliver Smithies, who shared the Nobel in medicine with two other researchers, told reporters in Stockholm.
"If you're born with happy genes you know that ... it's going to work," he said. He added that his first scientific experiment — constructing a telephone out of a dried pig's bladder and wood — was a failure.
Smithies, Briton Sir Martin Evans and American Mario Capecchi shared the 10 million Swedish kronor (euro1.1 million; US$1.6 million) prize for groundbreaking stem-cell research on mice that helped establish the role of individual genes in human ailments including diabetes, heart disease and cancer.
They will collect their diplomas and Nobel medals from King Carl XVI Gustaf at an award ceremony on Monday.
Capechi said successful scientists also needed imagination and attention to detail.
"It's the detail that actually makes sure the experiment works or doesn't work," he said at a news conference.
The imagination helps you think about the future, he said, adding, "don't think about today or tomorrow."
The three winners of the medical prize are being honored for their gene-targeting technique, which allows scientists deactivate or modify particular genes in mice, which in turn lets them study how those genes affect health and disease.
Evans said his favorite mouse was the "strain 129 SPEV," which led to the Nobel-winning discovery.
"Those mice are actually beautiful, lovely, tame mice," he said.
On a more philosophical note, Smithies said he considered the male-specific "Y chromosome" the biggest threat to mankind, because it's associated with aggressive behavior that leads to violence and war.
"That's greater than global warming because we can manage that eventually if we are smart and think. But we have to teach ourselves to solve problems by not fighting," he said.
The Nobel laureates arrived in the Swedish capital Wednesday and have a busy schedule ahead of them, including lectures, news conferences and meetings with diplomats and scientists.
The two oldest laureates this year — Nobel literature prize winner Doris Lessing and economics prize winner Leonid Hurwicz — will not attend the Stockholm celebrations.
The Nobel Peace Prize will be given to Al Gore and the U.N. climate panel in Oslo, Norway.
