Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Scientist who won a Nobel Prize for revealing protein structure using crystallography, advancing the chemistry of life.
On the island
Eight records
Plácido Domingo, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Claudio Abbado
Well, I thought I'd like to uh play you an aria from the first opera my mother took me to in in in Vienna. And that was the barber of Seville. And their figure, the barber, uh thinks that everybody's after him, everybody wants him. And he talks faster and faster and faster. And I, as a little boy, I laughed and laughed and laughed because I'd never heard anybody talk, let alone sing so fast.
Francisco Araiza, Wiener Singverein, Wiener Philharmoniker, Herbert von Karajan
I would should like to play a piece from Haydn's creation, the moment at the creation when God separates light from darkness and the chorus of the angry angels sings that there shall be light.
Fidelio (opening of the finale)
Tom Krause, Vienna State Opera Chorus, Vienna Philharmonic, Christoph von Dohnányi
Well, my third record is Don Fernando's aria, the minister's aria, in the finale of Fidelio, which follows the chorus of the prisoner and he sings, you know, now you will be free. Each brother looks for his brothers and Bruide Zuchtz and E Brude. And that to me is the most moving mo moment in the aria.
Piano Sonata No. 30 in E major, Op. 109 (third movement)Favourite
And I'm playing this because it has a wonderful consoling quality. Some years ago I contracted shingles and I was in agony, but the Beethoven sonatas calmed me down. They had a wonderfully consoling effect.
He's Got the Whole World in His Hands
Jessye Norman, Geoffrey Parsons
I chose this because hearing her at the festival hall was another one of my great musical experiences. You know, there there there was this tall, fulsome woman with an abundance of black hair standing off in all directions and which stood on the stage. She looked like the queen of all Africa, quite fantastic, and and her voice was just tremendous.
Piano Sonata in G major, D. 894 (second movement)
Again has significance for me because of the moment when I first heard it. A couple of years ago, Azar Berlin, the great philosopher, died, and there was a memorial meeting for him in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford. And then, to my surprise, Alfred Brandelborg walked in and he had his piano just ten yards away from me and started playing this this wonderful sonata.
Sonata for Solo Violin in D major, Op. 115
And then to my surprise, at the end of this, as it were, to fill in the space, I found a solo violin sonata of his, and which is just wonderful.
The Best of All Possible Worlds
Well, I thought I'd like to play you Doctor Panglas Aria from Voltaire's Condide. The Panglos Aria we live in the best of poss possible worlds, you know, in in in Condide. One disaster befalls the hero after the other. And then many times again Doctor Panglos says, but we live in the best of all possible worlds. And uh if you think about the past century, uh Voltaire's sarcastic comedies is very apt indeed.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:50What made you the kind of person who wanted to [solve the secret of life]?
I think I was foolish and optimistic thinking that I could tackle this. But my uh fellow graduate students thought it was mad to uh try such an impossible problems. And in fact, uh most people thought that I was wasting my life on something with uh which I would never be able to solve. And at times I did become quite desperate myself and wondered if they weren't right. But then somehow I managed to continue.
Presenter asks
3:51How did this lazy boy become this incredibly ambitious young man?
University turned me on for the first time. First of all, I discovered that that I liked work and I could do good work, and chemistry really interested me.
Presenter asks
4:10What are the qualities of a scientist who is going to tackle a seemingly insoluble problem?
You have to be really passionately interested to do this.
The keepsakes
Presenter asks
When and how did the breakthrough come? When did this black box suddenly begin to reveal itself?
In 1953, sixteen years after I had started, I had discovered the way of solving that problem, finding out which of these spots had a crest and which had a trough at the right moment... I developed my picture with my heart in my throat. And then I compared the diffraction pattern of these hemoglobin crystals to which I had attached a heavy atom mercury with those of the metal free. And when I saw these differences, I realized the problem was now solved.
Presenter asks
17:31How did [your parents] fare over here [in England]? Things must have been very different.
Um well it was very hard for them because th they were poor of course, you know... They couldn't they didn't bring anything out with them at all, nothing... my father who had never done any work with his hands, got himself apprenticed uh as a laser operator at a sort of school in Ledgeworth and bravely continued this work until the end of the war
Presenter asks
30:06What effect did having that [Nobel] prize have on you? Did it change you in any way or change your professional approach?
Uh not really. It enormously increased my self-confidence... I always felt very small compared to them and um not not all that sure of myself. But somehow the Nobel Prize really sort of told me that I was probably quite good at research... It really boosted my determination to to carry on.
“Surely the loss to mankind would be incalculable if I didn't win the Nobel Prize.”
“And then suddenly there was before me this molecule in three dimensions, this thing that nobody had ever seen. And you know, it was fantastic. It was sort of like discovering a new continent.”
“The the one secret is to find talented people and give them a free hand and make sure that they need everything for their own research.”
“Whatever I do is a social activity. Science is a social activity... a scientist no is not a s sort of man who toil toils away all secluded by himself trying to think.”