Sir Paul Nurse, a British biologist who won the 2001
Nobel Prize in medicine, will give the 2005 Thomas Hunt
Morgan Lecture on Thursday, Oct. 20, at Homewood.
The talk, scheduled for 4:30 p.m. in Mudd Hall
Auditorium, is part of the Pioneers in Biology Lecture
Series and will be followed by a reception.
Now president of Rockefeller University, Nurse shared
the Nobel with fellow Briton Tim Hunt and American Leland
Hartwell for their work on the key regulators of the cell
cycle. His talk — "Cell Cycle Control in Fission
Yeast" — will include a detailed discussion of his
Nobel-winning work, which led to the discovery of the gene
that controls cell division and continues to offer critical
insight into the nature of cancer and other devastating
diseases.
"It is a great honor to have Sir Paul take time out of
his schedule to come and visit the graduate students here
at Homewood," said Seamus Levine-Wilkinson, a member of
Pioneers in Biology, a group of graduate students in the
Krieger School of Arts and Sciences that organizes both the
Thomas Hunt Morgan and Christian B. Anfinsen lectures.
Nurse, described in a 2003 British newspaper article
as "the David Beckham of science," is known for eschewing
the usual lab-coated scientist image. For example, when
asked by a reporter how he would spend the million-dollar
Nobel Prize, he announced plans to purchase a new, larger
Kawasaki motorcycle. But Nurse is extremely serious about
cancer research. He serves as joint director of Cancer
Research UK, an organization that was formed when the
Imperial Cancer Research Fund and the Cancer Research Fund
joined forces in 2002.
Pioneers in Biology was organized this year to expose
Johns Hopkins students to Nobel-caliber scientists not just
through lectures but also through more casual contact.
"Pioneers in Biology is unique because the speakers
[will] participate in several informal activities with the
students, providing a significantly different experience
for both parties," Levine-Wilkinson said. "After all, for
the students, what could be better than eating crabs with a
Nobel laureate, and for the guest lecturer, what could be
more satisfying than getting to do something fun while
visiting to give a talk? Sir Paul Nurse has lived the dream
of many, if not all, graduate students. He has made
fundamental discoveries that not only continue to guide
exciting basic research around the world but that have also
offered critical insights into the nature of cancer."
The Thomas Hunt Morgan Lecture takes its name from an
alumnus who won the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine
in 1933. Morgan arrived at Johns Hopkins in 1886 to work in
a then young Biology Department, earning his doctorate in
1890 for work he did with sea spiders. He won the Nobel
when he was at Columbia University, where he spent much of
his career.
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