Ten Lessons from Chemistry Nobel Prize Winner

16:56, September 28, 2016

Dan Shechtman tells UrFU students how to make discoveries and become famous scientists

On September 26 at Ural Federal University, Professor Dan Shechtman, chemistry Nobel Prize laureate, talked to UrFU students about science and success. We chose ten most interesting lessons from his speech for those who weren't able to attend the meeting.

1. When I was very young, the person that affected me most was my grandfather, who came to Israel in 1906. He was a no-nonsense person, and he gave me the right answers, always. He bought me a present once that changed my life, and that present was a good quality magnifying glass. I was seven years old at that time, and I was walking outside, looking at insects, flowers – in high magnification of the glass. And I fell in love with the world of small things.

When I was ten years old, the teacher in school told the class, “We have a microscope in school”. And I said, “Oh, this is wonderful! Can you bring it to the class?” – “Yes”, he said. After begging him for seven weeks more, he finally brought it to the class and said, “Dan, you were the most interested child, come look in the microscope”. It was on his desk. So I came and looked in the microscope… and I couldn’t leave. It was little and very primitive, but it was still a microscope.

My next meeting with microscopy was when I did my Master’s degree at Technion. They bought the first transmission electron microscope. And I was the most interested student: I spent days and evenings with the technician who was building the TEM, and I was the first one to operate it – and the first one to become an expert in transmission electron microscopy. Being an expert means that I could teach – and I did.
This change of events – magnifying glass, microscope, transition electron microscope – paved my way into science.

2. OK, I’d like to tell you something about the Nobel prize. You don’t see many of us [Nobel prize winners] around here, so it’s the first chance to meet one for many of you. I’ll tell you what it takes to receive the Nobel prize. Number one, the most important thing about getting the Nobel prize is for somebody to nominate you. If you’re not nominated, there’s no chance you’ll get the Nobel prize. Why would somebody nominate you? Because you did very good science! How do they know that you did very good science? Because they read your papers – in English, not in Russian!

So they realize you are a very good scientist, you made a breakthrough, they read your papers, they heard you speak at international meetings – it’s important to present your work in international meetings! And then there are many people who are nominated for the prize, and the Committee, which is based only on members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, holds the elections and recommend the prize laureates to the Assembly of the Academy. They do it in June each year, and the announcement is done in October. In the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, there are hundreds of members – and nobody talks, nobody reveals the secret. Hundreds of people know who is going to be the winner – and nobody tells anyone! Something to learn from the Swedish!

3. I’ll tell you how I came to know that I received the Nobel prize. It is always a surprise, and it was a double surprise for me. I knew for many years that I was nominated for the prize after the discovery that I had made, but I always thought that if I would ever receive the Prize, I would receive it in Physics. And I was not really interested in that – I thought, “OK, if it comes, it comes, if it doesn’t come, I am a happy person anyway”. And I had received quite a few prizes besides that.

On October 4, 2011, they were announcing the prize in physics. So I listened to the radio – it was somebody else, and I said “OK, I’ve been waiting for so many years, another year is no problem”. So I got back to work.
The next day, October 5, they announced the prize in chemistry. I did not expect to receive the Nobel Prize in Chemistry – and I don’t know why, because it’s very logical! So, 11:15 in the morning, I am sitting in my office at the computer, and the telephone rings.

“Danny speaking”.

“Hello. This is the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Please hold the line, it’s a very important message.”

And I said, “O-oh…”

4. Some Nobel Prize laureates choose to develop further their laboratories, get more budgets from research and develop their science. I received the Nobel prize when I was almost at the date of retirement. I decided that I had done enough for science and wanted to do something for education – in my country and around the world. And this is what I do. On January 1 this year, I went to India, and since that day I have visited 24 countries. I give more than 100 lectures every year to young people around the world and in my country. I use my influence to create new endeavors, new educational programs.

5. We need more engineers and scientists. They develop the economy, they do the innovation, they do entrepreneurship, which means they open new start-ups, new high-tech companies. But the tendency today in many countries, including my country, is that young people don’t want to become engineers and scientists, they think it’s too difficult. My theory is that if you start teaching science at a very early age, they will like science. So I started a program in my hometown, Haifa, to teach science to kindergarten children. I’ve been doing it for three years already, and now it has developed into something very interesting: we build science kindergartens, and also science primary schools – in another city in Israel.

6. Nobody was looking for quasiperiodic material. If you read the books, they say that such materials cannot exist. Crystals were periodic and that’s it. This was in the definition of crystals. It was sheer luck. Let me elaborate a bit on that: what were your chances to be born? I’ll answer: zero. There’s nothing closer to zero that I know than your chances of being born. Your parents had to meet, your grandparents, then your great-grandparents and so on, up to the first ameba in this world. Zero! And yet here you are. Your life is the greatest gift that you’ve ever received. It’s better than a Mercedes-Benz, better than a Lamborghini. Each one of you was unbelievably lucky. Discoveries, in many cases, are also made by luck.

7. In order to succeed in science, my recommendation is the following: choose something that you like and become an expert in it. Become number one in something that you like and I promise you, you’ll have a wonderful career in science.

8. Many people did not believe me. My group leader once came into my office one day and said, “Doctor Shechtman, please read this book”, – it was a book on crystallography – “and you will understand that what you are talking about cannot be”. And I said to him, “I know this book. I teach at Technion, I don’t need to read it. I’m telling you, my material is not in the books”. He took the book back. When he came to me a couple of days later, he said, “I cannot let my name be associated with you. Please leave my group”. And I did, right away. It sounds terrible, but it was not: I didn’t have to leave my office or my laboratory, I just had to find another group that would adopt the scientific orphan, and that was it.

My greatest opponent was professor Linus Pauling, possibly the greatest chemist of the 20^th century and definitely in the United States, two times Nobel laureate. But when he came into the game, I was not alone anymore. We had published papers, and we had a growing community of young, avant-garde scientists around the world who joined the group, repeated my experiments, took my discovery and made it into big science. Linus Pauling started fighting against me and my colleagues in 1984, shortly after the announcement of the discovery. He fought me for 10 years. And you have to understand that he was the greatest chemist in the world! And he is one on one against me. So how do you react? Here is how I reacted. Number one, I knew that I was right. Because I was an expert in electron microscopy, and he was not. He might have been the greatest chemist, but I was an expert in my subject. And my colleagues, of course – they were repeating my experiments, developed them into great science, and they were on my side. We were a growing group, and his group of support was shrinking. And over the period of ten years, things changed.

9. Many young people around the world ask me, “What field would you recommend to engulf into?” I recommend going towards biology, biochemistry and related subjects. That field is so enormous, so complicated, that there’s work there for generations and generations of young and old scientists.

10. What should you do to become a country of hi-tech startups? First, you need good education for everyone, including people from small towns and villages. Second, you need good science and engineering education in universities. Third, the government support. Fourth, there must be free market economy. And finally, the fifth: there must be no corruption. It must be kept to the minimum in all countries, including Russia.