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Where
we should go
I"When I
got out of high school, I actually planned to look for work in a London hospital.
But for some reason I didn't board the train I had intended to take to London.
I can't clearly remember whether I was late or changed my mind, but the train
I took instead was bound for Oxford." This is what Niall Murphy told us,
speaking placidly. Coming from the UK, and presently a Senior Researcher in the
Neuronal Circuit Mechanisms Research Group, Mr. Murphy is studying the principles
of drug addiction, based on the relationship between behavior and the functioning
of neurons within the brain.
I was amazed that a decision that could so easily change a person's future could
be made so easily, but Mr. Murphy went on. "People sometimes think, 'This
was decided by fate'. But whichever course we pursue, we often end up in the same
place in the end. For example, here is something else that happened. After working
in Oxford for a year, I continued my studies at the University of London, and
intended to go to the University of Edinburgh, but for various reasons plans fell
through at the last minute. Fortunately, a professor of mine at the time suggested
going to Cambridge and helped me find a lab for my graduate studies there. Two
years later, my graduate supervisor moved to the University of Edinburgh, and
strangely I ended up a few meters down the corridor from where I thought I was
going in the first place. The road was different from that I had intended, but
in the end I arrived at the same place. Even if I had boarded that train to London,
I could just have easily ended up doing physicochemical research here at RIKEN."
Can
you explain your research to little children?
Senior researcher
Niall Murphy was born in the North of England, in a town near Manchester. From
the time he was 7-8 years old, he loved science, delighting in microscopes and
chemical sets. He pestered his parents to get him a computer, although computers
were still expensive then. When we asked whether this interest in science was
linked to his present interest in biology, he gave a wry smile. "Quite frankly,
I would have to say that I was not that interested in biology at that time of
my life. Plants, insects and snakes were of little interest to me as a high school
student." Later, working as a technical staff in that Oxford hospital gave
him the opportunity to experience medical science. He says that he even after
spending 10 years in research, there are times when he still fondly recalls the
chemistry sets he played with as a child.
"At the time, I gave my curiosity free rein, for example asking, 'What will
happen when I mix this chemical with that chemical?', and I enjoyed a lot of different
things. Of course, I bring a great deal of eagerness and interest to the research
theme I am currently engaged in. But in fact, there is something enviable about
my situation at that time, allowing me to enjoy simple experiments completely
as I pleased. Of course, the "research' I was doing at that time was completely
useless, but..." Here Mr. Murphy smiled like a naughty child.
"Even so...," he said, his face becoming serious once more, "Naturally,
I came to understand things with more depth as I made my way through high school,
university, and then in my work as a researcher. It occasionally worries me that,
while specific areas of my knowledge have deepened, other areas have narrowed.
It is important for me to delve more and more deeply into my research theme. But
would I be able to explain its content so that, for example, an elementary school
student could understand it? Of course, one could anticipate such a situation
in many areas of research. I feel that if we are unable to explain our work in
a manner understandable to non-specialists, then we have to question whether or
not we are losing sight of its relevance to people and society."
Research
can be likened to simultaneously watching several television monitors.
"Sometimes
I imagine research to be like watching a long line of television monitors,"
says Mr. Murphy. "It recently occurred to me that in spite of the fact that
there were various monitors all around me, working alone only gave me time to
concentrate on my own monitor. Now I'm in a position to watch some of the peripheral
monitors at the same time, and this makes me very happy, as a researcher."
Finally, I asked, "How would you explain your research theme to your own
child?" Mr. Murphy smiled slightly, mentioned that he was still single, and
then went on, looking somewhat hard put to explain: "If I had a child, this
is what I would say. 'Daddy's research is about why people want to do some things,
but don't want to do other things. In other words, I'm studying why it is that
you don't want to do your homework. Now hurry up and get on with it."
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