If we understand the worm, we understand life.

Our work on C. elegans emphasized the benefits of sharing large amounts of information. We took a global approach to discover the mechanisms that led to the development of the worm.

It was a matter of not living lavishly but enjoying what you had, growing things with your hands, working hard, but not being tied to a nine-to-five job, and generally feeling that there's more to life than money.

What is the purpose of being human and alive without doing new things?

I wandered along to the chemistry labs, more or less on the rebound, and asked about becoming a research student. It was the '60s, a time of university expansion: the doors were open, and a 2:1 was good enough to get me in.

In order to protect the market value of a proprietary database, the owner must prohibit redistribution of the contents - otherwise, the information would quickly leak out and be widely known.