So I went to a lecture this afternoon by double Nobel Laureate K. Barry Sharpless...

[NNadir]

...The lecture was folksy actually, just advice on how to find useful things.

He was very proud of pointing to an article in the Los Angeles Times referring to his first Nobel Prize titled "San Diego Man Wins the Nobel Prize by Combining Wine and Paint." (The Sharpless Asymmetric epoxidation utilizes a titanium oxide (paint) derived complex with a tartaric acid (wine) auxiliary.)

He recently won a second Nobel, shared with Carolyn Bertozzi, for "click chemistry" and his commentary on it was to remark that simple stuff, in particular water, is wonderful.

One of his slides had this advice which people in my lab have kind of shoved in my face on a few occasions where I informed them that stuff wouldn't work and they proved that what I said wouldn't work did work:

"Despite abundant reasons why something won't work, try it anyway.

Rules have exceptions, the literature can mislead, and who are we to think we know anything at all, when even modeestly complex systems are actually completely out of (our) control."

He suggested reading Out of Control by Kevin Kelly, which he said changed his life.

I guess I should read it, but realistically, I won't.

But really, an even more compelling lecture was by Joe Biden's Undersecretary for Science and Innovation, Geraldine Richmond, who grew up the daughter of a beautician and farmer/small store owner in very rural Kansas. She talked about her life - she's a leading researcher in laser spectroscopic investigations of the chemistry of surfaces - and her rise in her career beginning by being inspired by her high school teacher being impressed by how she solved a geometric problem differently than he had done.

Much of her efforts in her career have been directed at addressing sexism in science, her interest being spurred in the subject by her own career and reflections on an undergraduate course she took for distribution entitled "Sex and Science." She has been a tireless worker driving for equity in science.

In 2012 she received the National Medal of Science from President Obama; the medal was on display in the back of the hall along with a picture of her with the President.

It was a wonderful day, good food, fine wine, and an intellectual feast of sorts.

I'm glad I went. Part of me wanted to blow it off because I'm so damned tired and so pressed for time. It was held at the Science History Institute in Philadelphia which has a very cool museum where among other things, early examples of scientific instruments are on display. Especially cool for me was the historic mass specs. I was tired, had an intense week including a scientific meeting on, well, mass specs, where people were claiming to be able to discern thousands of proteins in a single cell. It is startling to see how much this technology has advanced in my short life.

It is the best of times, and the worst of times, to be living on this planet and this was a perfect day for feeling it.

[NewHendoLib]

1. There were stories about Sharpless when I was a grad school at Dartmouth

he was there some years before I was, as a Dartmouth undergrad. He was known for going through the chemical stock room and opening bottles and smelling them to learn first hand of how the various bottles smelled. Apparently he got a good whiff of something that knocked him on his butt - he was OK, but was found on the floor!

I got to see him do chem lectures quite a few times - brilliant man.

Glad you had a great day! Thanks for sharing.

[NNadir]

2. One of the topics he discussed was his work with selenium, and its smell.

He said that thiols have nothing on selenols, referring to the smell.

I guess he didn't learn his lesson at Dartmouth. He knows how stuff smells.

He did say that he's been a little annoyed that so many chemists work to avoid water. Simple is better was a theme. (The event had a number of discussions of water in the prequel.)

As for selenium. I have made selenophenols and I know of what he speaks. When I finally started dating my wife - after chasing her for a number of years with no luck - I was working with these compounds. Wearing gloves did not prevent them from impregnating my hands. Years later my wife told me, after we'd been married, that the way I smelled was a problem for her, but she overcame it somehow. That was very, very, very lucky for me.

I worked for a company that made selenomethionine as a sort of side project; it wasn't my project however. (Recently I learned that the UGA stop codon actually evolved from a selenocysteine codon, and that even beyond bacteria, even in humans, sometimes that codon for selenocysteine is active.)

In the case where I was making selenophenols, I was at least trying to be safe; at least I was wearing gloves (in particular because I hated the smell) but I confess I was a bit of a slob in the lab. I'm certainly aware that one can absorb ethyl ether percutaneously.

For many years, I worked with phosgene. I recall walking with my wife in San Diego after a rain, and they mowed the grass and I said, "Wow, that smells like phosgene."

It is, of course, disturbing that I know how phosgene smells. A more careful chemist wouldn't, no matter how much he, she or they worked with it.

Somehow both Sharpless and I are both alive, one of our few similarities. He's an old man and so am I. As he began the talk, he was somewhat halting, but soon warmed up and was fascinating.

He put up a picture of Feynman and a quote of his: "I am intelligent enough to know how dumb I am."

I believe that applies to me, not that I'm anywhere near the level of those guys. It's a joke to make a comparison. At every major scientific meeting I go to I feel going in that I know something, and come out recognizing how stupid I am.

Thanks for the story about Sharpless. He wouldn't get away with that today.