“I think there's a little bit of romanticism in science still. I find that the dreamers are usually the ones that make it.” Practical work, like conducting experiments and gathering data, might be central to a scientist’s job. But there is also room for dreams and imagination – which can help us find the gaps in our knowledge, and dare to ask unexpected questions. 

Ardem Patapoutian received the 2021 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine together with David Julius for their discoveries of receptors for temperature and touch. In this episode, Patapoutian discusses the importance teamwork and diversity in the lab, and the art of learning from experience – and from failure. 

Your host is Adam Smith, Chief Scientific Officer at Nobel Prize Outreach.

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In this episode, meet football fan and chemist David MacMillan. Together with podcast host Adam Smith, he speaks about the importance of storytelling and his strong belief that “science is supposed to be about having fun, it is not supposed to be about intimidating people.”

MacMillan shares his journey from a family where no one had gone to university to becoming a Nobel Prize laureate. He was awarded the chemistry prize in 2021 for the development of asymmetric organocatalysis. We also hear about how his upbringing in Scotland shaped him as a scientist and why his parents insisted that he went to university.

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"One minute I was a teenager and the next minute I was a woman.” – Leymah Gbowee shares her heartbreaking life story of a happy childhood cruelly interrupted by the Liberian civil war. Nobel Prize Outreach's Adam Smith is your host as Gbowee also talks about her constant and tireless struggle for women’s rights and peace in her home country. Her never-give-up attitude has been a constant in her life and work, and something she tries to instil in young people, encouraging them ”to believe that they can do whatever they put their mind to”.

Leymah Gbowee shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 for her peace work. 

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This special live episode features a conversation with Klaus Hasselmann, the 2021 physics laureate. Before that we will also present some highlights from this year’s announcement telephone interviews. Hear Klaus Hasselmann alongside his fellow 2021 laureates David Julius, Benjamin List, David MacMillan and Ardem Patapoutian – and relive some of the moments of disbelief, shock and excitement from the calls.

From the stage of Nobel Week Dialogue in Gothenburg Sweden, podcast producer Karin Svensson reprises her guest role as host of the show, asking Adam Smith about the new crop of 2021 telephone interviews. Then, Nobel Prize Outreach’s Adam Smith takes the helm for a conversation with Klaus Hasselmann. 

Klaus Hasselmann received the Nobel Prize in physics for developing climate models to reliably predict global warming. He shares the prize with Syukuro Manabe and Giorgio Parisi. He is a professor emeritus of the University of Hamburg and a former director of the Max Planck institute for meteorology. 

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”Sometimes I make a mistake during the lecture, I'll make an argument that's not quite right and not even notice it, and a student will catch me. I just love it when students do that.” – Economic sciences laureate Paul Milgrom loves being a teacher. He also loves when his students correct him and ask him hard questions that he doesn't know the answer to. In this podcast episode the Nobel Prize's Adam Smith speaks to economist Milgrom about his own school years and what type of teacher he aspires to be.

Paul Milgrom shared the prize in economic sciences with his PhD advisor Robert Wilson for their research on auction theories.

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“I won the Nobel Prize so I built a much bigger house than I ever planned.” — Wole Soyinka envisioned a small cottage on a large plot of land as a retreat for his writing, but a phone call from Stockholm made it possible to super-size his plans with rooms for many artists to dedicate themselves to their work. Literature laureate Wole Soyinka, who only very occasionally grants interviews, speaks to the Nobel Prize's Adam Smith about his photographic memory, his creative process and the question of who he writes literature for. His home of Nigeria figures prominently in his writing, and he looks ahead to the future of his country. Wole Soyinka also tells us about his passion for space and space travel, or as he puts it, "I am a space nut!"

Wole Soyinka was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature 1986 and in 2021 he published his first novel for almost 50 years.

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"When people think about other worlds, they think about other life." Nobel Prize Laureate Didier Queloz was a pioneering explorer of exoplanets – planets outside our own solar system – and now he finds himself at the centre of a new endeavour, the ETH Center for the Origin & Prevalence of Life. Here, scientists from a variety of disciplines will meet to challenge their limits and hopefully make some breakthroughs. "The gaps between disciplines are exploratory places," as Queloz puts it.

Didier Queloz speaks to the Nobel Prize's Adam Smith about sending seasoned researchers like himself to scientific boot camp, the importance of science and science communication, and what finding ET might mean for the future of humankind.

Queloz received the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics together with Michel Mayor for their research on exoplanets.

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“I make discoveries just because of very unique juxtapositions that I have never seen before. So there is some kind of resonance there.” – The creative and poetic chemistry laureate Joachim Frank always aspires to solve problems by looking at places no one has looked before. In this episode he describes how creative endeavours like "Poetry boxing" and photography have been essential to his successes in scientific research. He also relates how his life was shaped by his experiences growing up in the ruins of post-war Germany.

Joachim Frank was awarded the chemistry prize in 2017 "for developing cryo-electron microscopy for the high-resolution structure determination of biomolecules in solution." The host of Nobel Prize Conversations is Adam Smith, Chief Scientific Officer at Nobel Prize Outreach.

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Medicine laureate Elizabeth Blackburn has strong feelings about the value of science. In this conversation with Adam Smith, she speaks openly about how society must begin to understand just how important science is in our lives. She also discusses the climate crisis and shares her experiences from a recent visit to Antartica, where she found herself reminded of the severe consequences of climate change. They also take time for an exploration of the future of science, including the future of Blackburn's own research.

Elizabeth Blackburn was the 2009 Nobel Prize laureate in physiology or medicine. The host of Nobel Prize Conversations is Adam Smith, Chief Scientific Officer at Nobel Prize Outreach.

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“The only sad thing is there aren’t more hours in the day!” – After a busy, tiring Sunday, mountain biking with the family, Guido Imbens’ Monday morning wake-up call came a little after 2am with the news from Stockholm. “I’m sure that the adrenaline will get me through,” he says in this conversation with Adam Smith recorded shortly afterwards, with the excitement building around him: “Things have been hectic here!” He speaks about the benefits of the social side of research, the enjoyment of working with bright young minds, and the pure pleasure of just getting up and going to work.

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