my name is William and I am a scientific
researcher at the Swedish University of
Agricultural Sciences in all art and so
for my scientific research for my
research I study the genetics of insect
crop pests with focus on those that
damage apple which is a major product
here in stone ax ever since I saw the
movie Jurassic Park as a teenager I knew
that I wanted to be a genetic engineer
but aside from my desire to use the
power of genetics to bring big scary
mobsters back from extinction I was also
inspired by my high school biology
teacher and his lessons on the genetic
code and blueprint for lights at the
Agricultural University I have
successfully taken genes from pest moths
and transferred them into the genome of
a genetic model organism the common
fruit fly doing this allows us to more
easily study the genes of the pest moths
and this promotes a better understanding
of their basic biology but above and
beyond my passion for fundamental
genetics I believe that we should not
just do research for the sake of
generating basic knowledge rather that
we should we should strive to put that
knowledge to practical use for the
betterment of our societies and towards
greater economic and environmental
sustainability I’ve chosen to do
research in the agricultural sector
because I think that food safety and
food security are two very important
issues that we will be facing in the
21st century as
adapt to a world with exponentially
increasing human population global
climate change and diminishing
non-renewable resources that is my
purpose the big idea that I’d like to
share with you today in turn is the
complicated relationship between science
and technology and why what we do as
scientists is so important we prefer
that the path between scientific
discovery and practical application or
technology look like this
simple easy direct but in reality it
quite often looks like this very messy
sometimes scientific discoveries and
even lead to technological advances in
seemingly unexpected or unrelated areas
over the next 10 minutes or so I will be
exploring this idea further the
footprints of science are all around us
hiding in plain sight the benefits of
scientific research blend into the
backgrounds of our daily lives and are
taken completely for granted but
scientific research is so essential to
our collective human civilization that
world governments invest billions and
billions of dollars in scientific
research every year they even put
world-famous scientists on paper money
for acknowledgement for their
contributions to our societies science
however is not just hidden the truths
revealed it’s also the methodical
process used to uncover the secrets of
nature and while technology is seemingly
advanced
quite rapidly these days as our last
speaker pointed out scientific research
is pain staking ly slow in this era of
instant communication scientific
research is simply not fast enough and
with the breathtaking speed of
technological progress the expectations
for science are greater than ever before
there is especially an increasing
impatience with the pace at which
medical research progresses having
failed year after year to provide cures
for diseases such as cancer and
Alzheimer’s how much human suffering and
devastation result from these and when
will it end
in my own field economic costs due to
insect pests damage are immense
amounting to billions of dollars every
year and tons and tons of food product
damaged and destroyed by insects out in
the fields before ever even making it to
market in addition to being slow
scientific research is also very
expensive and you had better believe
that those paying for it expect
accountability there is thus a need to
demonstrate tangible public benefit
resulting from all of the billions and
billions invested in scientific research
every year but here’s the thing there
isn’t always an obvious direct path
between science and technology how then
can we as societies know which areas to
invest in when the prognosis is so
unclear
in the post-world War 2 era a scientific
adviser to US president Harry Truman
answered this question arguing in favor
of investing broad scale in basic
scientific research without
discrimination or expectation of
practicality and I quote him discoveries
pertinent to medical progress have often
come from remote and uh unexpected
sources and it is certain that this will
be true in the future now I will give a
couple of examples illustrating how this
has been true
this was one of the first computers ever
created 1946 maybe one of them could fit
up here on stage nowadays however almost
everyone here is likely to have a
pocket-sized mini computer that is far
more powerful than the computing
equipment that was used to send man to
the moon how did this happen well first
it would not be possible without
semiconductors semiconductors are almost
magical yet naturally occurring
materials that have the properties of
both a conductor and insulator of
electric current this makes them
incredibly useful semiconductors were
actually first discovered way back in
the 1830s but it wasn’t until advances
in quantum physics around 100 years
later that semiconductors can be fully
understood and eventually applied to
integrated circuit boards giving way to
the modern computer so this is really a
story 200 years in the making the next
example is a
technology that I will be using in my
own research this year it’s called
CRISPR Cass genome editing you may have
heard of it it’s been in the news lately
CRISPR is a very precise gene editing
system that holds great promise to cure
almost any genetic disease imaginable
and solve all of humankind’s problems
okay so that’s a bit of an exaggeration
but here’s the thing the science behind
CRISPR technology was not originally
focused on discovering a way to edit
genes it’s a story that goes back 30
years involving multiple research groups
across the globe first in 1987 there was
the discovery of odd genetic features in
the genomes of bacteria and then around
20 years later the demonstration that
these genetic features were actually
part of a primitive bacterial immune
system and finally around 2013 a couple
of reports showing that these genetic
features could be exploited to edit
virtually any gene in the genome of
virtually any life-form who could have
ever predicted that the immune system of
a bacteria could be so useful and so we
will be using CRISPR to edit the genes
in our Apple pest moths and this will
allow them this will allow us to
understand their genetics in greater
detail than we ever could before so to
wrap things up my message is this
scientific progress doesn’t happen
overnight the grand outcome
of scientific discoveries are rarely
foreseen with great clarity and these
sources of technological advances often
cannot be predicted well in advance
perhaps this is so not due to lack of
direction or randomness but rather that
the scientific process reflects human
abilities what is science more then
digging beneath the surface probing at
nature and illuminating the invisible
it’s not easy genes atoms microbes
electromagnetic waves these things are
not intuitive to us because throughout
most of our evolutionary history knowing
about them was not necessary for our
survival and it’s like out of sight out
of mind
but our shared human civilization has
been built upon discovery of the unknown
we wouldn’t be where we are in the world
today without it at the AG university my
group does research on insect pests that
damage crops we aim for better more
environmentally sustainable ways to
control insect damage by exploiting the
insects sense of smell to distract in
misdirect them from the crops but our
research approach is rooted in the
fields of neuro biology chemistry
genetics ecology and evolution within
the life sciences these are all very
different disciplines with different
methods and different objectives our
contributions to these fields may indeed
filter across the scientific community
possibly leading to advances
in science and technology that are far
removed from controlling insect pests so
my challenge to you is this
whenever you next see a story on the
news or in social media about some
ridiculous absurd sounding scientific
research study such as the mating ritual
of a sea slug or or the study of autism
in a fruit fly remember this if you dig
beneath the surface you will likely
discover that there is a very important
purpose for why this basic research is
being done and some day it may even
contribute to making the world a better
place thank you
researcher at the Swedish University of
Agricultural Sciences in all art and so
for my scientific research for my
research I study the genetics of insect
crop pests with focus on those that
damage apple which is a major product
here in stone ax ever since I saw the
movie Jurassic Park as a teenager I knew
that I wanted to be a genetic engineer
but aside from my desire to use the
power of genetics to bring big scary
mobsters back from extinction I was also
inspired by my high school biology
teacher and his lessons on the genetic
code and blueprint for lights at the
Agricultural University I have
successfully taken genes from pest moths
and transferred them into the genome of
a genetic model organism the common
fruit fly doing this allows us to more
easily study the genes of the pest moths
and this promotes a better understanding
of their basic biology but above and
beyond my passion for fundamental
genetics I believe that we should not
just do research for the sake of
generating basic knowledge rather that
we should we should strive to put that
knowledge to practical use for the
betterment of our societies and towards
greater economic and environmental
sustainability I’ve chosen to do
research in the agricultural sector
because I think that food safety and
food security are two very important
issues that we will be facing in the
21st century as
adapt to a world with exponentially
increasing human population global
climate change and diminishing
non-renewable resources that is my
purpose the big idea that I’d like to
share with you today in turn is the
complicated relationship between science
and technology and why what we do as
scientists is so important we prefer
that the path between scientific
discovery and practical application or
technology look like this
simple easy direct but in reality it
quite often looks like this very messy
sometimes scientific discoveries and
even lead to technological advances in
seemingly unexpected or unrelated areas
over the next 10 minutes or so I will be
exploring this idea further the
footprints of science are all around us
hiding in plain sight the benefits of
scientific research blend into the
backgrounds of our daily lives and are
taken completely for granted but
scientific research is so essential to
our collective human civilization that
world governments invest billions and
billions of dollars in scientific
research every year they even put
world-famous scientists on paper money
for acknowledgement for their
contributions to our societies science
however is not just hidden the truths
revealed it’s also the methodical
process used to uncover the secrets of
nature and while technology is seemingly
advanced
quite rapidly these days as our last
speaker pointed out scientific research
is pain staking ly slow in this era of
instant communication scientific
research is simply not fast enough and
with the breathtaking speed of
technological progress the expectations
for science are greater than ever before
there is especially an increasing
impatience with the pace at which
medical research progresses having
failed year after year to provide cures
for diseases such as cancer and
Alzheimer’s how much human suffering and
devastation result from these and when
will it end
in my own field economic costs due to
insect pests damage are immense
amounting to billions of dollars every
year and tons and tons of food product
damaged and destroyed by insects out in
the fields before ever even making it to
market in addition to being slow
scientific research is also very
expensive and you had better believe
that those paying for it expect
accountability there is thus a need to
demonstrate tangible public benefit
resulting from all of the billions and
billions invested in scientific research
every year but here’s the thing there
isn’t always an obvious direct path
between science and technology how then
can we as societies know which areas to
invest in when the prognosis is so
unclear
in the post-world War 2 era a scientific
adviser to US president Harry Truman
answered this question arguing in favor
of investing broad scale in basic
scientific research without
discrimination or expectation of
practicality and I quote him discoveries
pertinent to medical progress have often
come from remote and uh unexpected
sources and it is certain that this will
be true in the future now I will give a
couple of examples illustrating how this
has been true
this was one of the first computers ever
created 1946 maybe one of them could fit
up here on stage nowadays however almost
everyone here is likely to have a
pocket-sized mini computer that is far
more powerful than the computing
equipment that was used to send man to
the moon how did this happen well first
it would not be possible without
semiconductors semiconductors are almost
magical yet naturally occurring
materials that have the properties of
both a conductor and insulator of
electric current this makes them
incredibly useful semiconductors were
actually first discovered way back in
the 1830s but it wasn’t until advances
in quantum physics around 100 years
later that semiconductors can be fully
understood and eventually applied to
integrated circuit boards giving way to
the modern computer so this is really a
story 200 years in the making the next
example is a
technology that I will be using in my
own research this year it’s called
CRISPR Cass genome editing you may have
heard of it it’s been in the news lately
CRISPR is a very precise gene editing
system that holds great promise to cure
almost any genetic disease imaginable
and solve all of humankind’s problems
okay so that’s a bit of an exaggeration
but here’s the thing the science behind
CRISPR technology was not originally
focused on discovering a way to edit
genes it’s a story that goes back 30
years involving multiple research groups
across the globe first in 1987 there was
the discovery of odd genetic features in
the genomes of bacteria and then around
20 years later the demonstration that
these genetic features were actually
part of a primitive bacterial immune
system and finally around 2013 a couple
of reports showing that these genetic
features could be exploited to edit
virtually any gene in the genome of
virtually any life-form who could have
ever predicted that the immune system of
a bacteria could be so useful and so we
will be using CRISPR to edit the genes
in our Apple pest moths and this will
allow them this will allow us to
understand their genetics in greater
detail than we ever could before so to
wrap things up my message is this
scientific progress doesn’t happen
overnight the grand outcome
of scientific discoveries are rarely
foreseen with great clarity and these
sources of technological advances often
cannot be predicted well in advance
perhaps this is so not due to lack of
direction or randomness but rather that
the scientific process reflects human
abilities what is science more then
digging beneath the surface probing at
nature and illuminating the invisible
it’s not easy genes atoms microbes
electromagnetic waves these things are
not intuitive to us because throughout
most of our evolutionary history knowing
about them was not necessary for our
survival and it’s like out of sight out
of mind
but our shared human civilization has
been built upon discovery of the unknown
we wouldn’t be where we are in the world
today without it at the AG university my
group does research on insect pests that
damage crops we aim for better more
environmentally sustainable ways to
control insect damage by exploiting the
insects sense of smell to distract in
misdirect them from the crops but our
research approach is rooted in the
fields of neuro biology chemistry
genetics ecology and evolution within
the life sciences these are all very
different disciplines with different
methods and different objectives our
contributions to these fields may indeed
filter across the scientific community
possibly leading to advances
in science and technology that are far
removed from controlling insect pests so
my challenge to you is this
whenever you next see a story on the
news or in social media about some
ridiculous absurd sounding scientific
research study such as the mating ritual
of a sea slug or or the study of autism
in a fruit fly remember this if you dig
beneath the surface you will likely
discover that there is a very important
purpose for why this basic research is
being done and some day it may even
contribute to making the world a better
place thank you
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