Nobel Prize Conversations ”In a number of my works, I am just narrating a tale for whoever is interested” In this podcast episode with literature laureate Wole Soyinka, conducted in November 2021, he talks about his photographic memory, his creative process and the question of who he writes literature for. His home of Nigeria figures…

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As Ernst Ruska discovered, having an ingenious idea like the electron microscope can occur in the blink of an eye, but overcoming the finer details to create a successfully working instrument can take years. Two incredible circles closed for in December 1986, at the age of 80. The first was that Ruska was finally receiving…

The concept that matter is made up of tiny atoms has been proposed for millennia, but we rely on our five senses to provide the ultimate truth. The 1986 Nobel Prize for Physics rewarded two radical leaps in microscope technology that finally allowed us to witness life at the atomic level. The light microscope, invented…

Creating and sculpting cells and organs that develop in the embryo requires the construction signals to be delivered at the right place and the right time. It was long presumed that the main cues come from molecular signals produced and sent out from distant and specialised glands, but as it turns out, this process also…

Yuan Tseh Lee was born on November 19, 1936 in Hsinchu, Taiwan. His father is an accomplished artist and his mother a school teacher. He started his early education while Taiwan was under Japanese occupation – a result of a war between China and Japan in 1894. His elementary education was disrupted soon after it…