GCSE Science: Venki Ramakrishnan - The race in science

Ben:
Hi, I'm Ben, I'm 14, I'm from Cambridge.

Kyani:
I'm Kyani, I'm 15, and I'm also from Cambridge.

Venki:
I'm Venki Ramakrishnan and I'm a scientist at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge. Often, vaccine development takes years, but sometimes there's a global emergency, as we had with the COVID pandemic and the development of a vaccine is a race against time.

Kyani:
How did they develop the COVID 19 vaccine so quickly?

Venki:
On the one hand, it is amazing that vaccines were developed so quickly. But on the other hand, what went into the vaccine is based on years of development and successive generations of knowledge, and each group of scientists who work on it, build on previous scientists’ knowledge and they in turn provide knowledge for subsequent generations of scientists. So you can think of it as a sort of long relay of knowledge and this development of the vaccine, you can think of that as the last lap.

Ben:
What about competition? Does that inspire people to work faster and better or will it cause problems in some way?

Venki:
I think science is a mixture of competition and cooperation. Science really needs people to cooperate to help each other share knowledge. But competition also makes people work harder and faster because in science, you often get credit for being the first person to discover something. And just like in sports, competition drives up standards, makes people give their best. But science is not just competition. Sometimes people who are competing are also helping each other because they're publishing their papers. As soon as you publish, they've learned what you've done and then if they do something, you're learning from them as well. So, you're indirectly collaborating, even while competing.

Kyani:Did it ever feel overwhelming, first working in a proper professional lab?

Venki:
Yeah, so you know, I grew up in India and I didn't go to very famous universities initially. And so, the first time I went to a top research university, I did feel a bit intimidated thinking that, well, maybe I have fooled them and they're going to find out how really dumb I am. And then, you know, they'll regret actually hiring me here or, you know, allowing me to study here. And so you do get this feeling of being an imposter. But I think you have to realise almost everybody feels that, even the people who you think are not outsiders actually deep down they worry whether they're actually up to it or not. When I first came to this lab, I remember being intimidated, but then I saw a lot of these famous scientists and they were just like anybody else. They were ignorant about lots of things. And, you know, they weren't always right, and they weren't afraid to ask questions, you know about things they didn't know. Science is really about finding out, you know, the answers to questions rather than about status or being sort of in awe of somebody. Well, it's been nice chatting with both of you.

Kyani:It was lovely to meet you.

Ben:
Yeah, nice to meet you. Thanks a lot.

Venki:
All right. Have fun.

Ben:
I've learned that although there is competition within science, no matter what, you all kind of collaborating and working together because at the end of the day, we're trying to make a discovery and it doesn't really matter who makes it first.

Kyani:
When you think about people in professions such as this, you think, oh, they know exactly what they're doing, 24-7, it must be very easy for them. But they're just like everybody else. And I feel like when you gain experience and you gain knowledge, then you become more at ease.