Image: ICRF

Paul Nurse is one of Britain¿s most distinguished scientists today. His groundbreaking work on the cell cycle in the 1970s and '80s revealed how cells make the decisions to grow and divide, thus laying the foundation for a molecular understanding of cancer. This has earned him numerous honors, including the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award in 1998, and many regard him a prime candidate for the Nobel Prize. Since 1996 Sir Paul, who was knighted last year, has also been director-general of the largest cancer research organization in the U.K., the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF).

I met Paul Nurse at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories in New York on a sunny afternoon in June, just a few hours before he was to give a talk to several hundred scientists attending the 65th CSH Symposium. Since alcohol-free beer was not available at the bar, he brought a bottle of Perrier water outside with him, where we planned to chat. I had a cup of English Breakfast tea, hoping it would help tune my brain to his accent.

With his white shirt partly unbuttoned and his sleeves rolled up, Nurse did not give the immediate impression of someone in charge of 1,000 scientists, clinicians and technicians. But his appearance didn¿t fool anyone at the conference. Many people greeted him with respect as we made our way outside, fully aware that he is a scientific heavyweight. A biologist at heart, Nurse directed us to a tree, where we sat down on the grass; the birds sang above us, and only the occasional airplane disrupted the peaceful atmosphere of the labs. Highlights from our conversation follow.

SA: When did you decide to become a scientist? Was that quite early, or only at university?

PN: Well, I think actually already as a schoolchild. I remember seeing Sputnik 2 when I was in London. As a young child, eight or nine years old, I read about it in the newspaper and went out in our garden and saw Sputnik 2 fly over, I think in 1957 or 1958, and this was truly amazing. And then when I was a little older I became interested in natural history, and I watched birds, and I collected beetles, and was interested in plants and so on. So my main entr¿e into biology was through natural history. I think that is quite common.

SA: Was it always clear you wanted to become a biologist, not a physicist or an astronomer?

PN: Yes, but I became a bit "harder," if you like, as I got older, because originally I was more interested in natural history and ecology, and then I found it so difficult, because the laboratory of this field [pointing to the grass] is too uncontrolled. So as I grew older, as an undergraduate and then as a postgraduate, I really wanted to work more on molecular and cellular things, because you could do controlled experiments so much better.

SA: So that led you into biochemistry rather than "old-fashioned" classic biology?

PN: Yes, into biochemistry rather than the "fur and feather."

SA: Who do you consider your most important teacher?

PN: I had a very good teacher of biology at school, who I recently met again actually, a man called Keith Neal. Then I think a very important person was my postdoctoral advisor, when I was in the University of Edinburgh, Professor Murdoch Mitchison, who gave me great freedom as a young investigator and allowed me to work in my own way. I owe him great debt for that. He encouraged me, he spoke to me, but he really made no attempt to control me, a very good situation.

THE CELL CYCLE

SA: You are mostly famous for your work on the cell cycle, the cell machinery that controls cell division in eukaryotes. Could you explain what your most important discovery was?