• Question: What are the discoveries that lead to your current job?

    Asked by Karishma to anuantony, Duncan, Jayne, Katherine, Sajid on 8 Nov 2017.
    • Photo: Duncan McNicholl

      Duncan McNicholl answered on 8 Nov 2017:

      I guess the big two are fibre optics, which have been around as an idea since someone realised you could shine a light down a stream of water as it poured out of a container, and lasers, which were developed from something called masers in the 60s, I think. That sounds like I made up the word maser, but it’s a real think, I promise. If I was going to makes something up, I’d call it a kaser instead.

    • Photo: Jayne Ede

      Jayne Ede answered on 9 Nov 2017:

      Unfortunately, humanity’s ability to be nasty to each other. So in World War I and II some people invented some really nasty chemicals that they used in fighting, like sulfur mustard (‘mustard gas’), nerve agents, choking gases and things. After World War II the World sort of came together and realised that these were out of control, and decided to ban them globally – only 4 countries in the whole World haven’t banned them.
      Unfortunately, they do still get used despite the bans, so we have to find ways of protecting ourselves from those chemicals. This might be in cleaning solutions to destroy the chemicals, as medicines for people that have come into contact with them, or as protective suits to protect anyone that might come into contact with them.

      Of course, all those things have a history too! So years of researching cleaning products, years of researching medicines and the human body, years of researching fabrics and materials… Scientists take other people’s discoveries and try to apply them in new ways, or build on them.

      Isaac Newton called this, ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’ – I like that, because it really brings home how much we rely on each others efforts 🙂

    • Photo: Sajid Javed

      Sajid Javed answered on 13 Nov 2017:

      in my job i study DNA so the discovery of it was quite significant. however, the main thing that has lead to my job is the sequencing of the human genome and the methods and techniques used to do it. the project cost $3 billion to complete and took 13 years to sequence a human genome. it was complete in 2003. today the cost of sequencing a human genome is about $3000. there have been huge technological advancements in this area and it has made it accessible and a number of diagnostic test have been created from it. the field that has benefited the most is cancer.

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