• Question: what surprised you the most when you were researching diseases?

    Asked by millie to Becky on 23 Nov 2021.
    • Photo: Becky Cohen

      Becky Cohen answered on 23 Nov 2021:

      The thing that surprised me most was how rarely huge breakthroughs (or ‘eureka’ moments!) actually happen in research. In reality, research is very collaborative and big breakthroughs usually come following years and years of research all over the world and lots of small findings coming together to allow ‘bigger picture’ discoveries to be made.

Comments

  • Photo: Yannick

    Yannick commented on :

    For me is how much is complex. In cancer, for example, it is totally incredible how 1 cells become crazy and never stop to grow.
    It always surprising to see how cancers cells can find way to avoid to be kill by a treatment.
    You try to starve them and they will develop another mechanism to feed.
    You try to kill them with a molecule and they will find a way to avoid the entry of the drug into the cells.
    You try to stop a very mechanism in the cell and they don’t care because there will use an other one.

  • Photo: Magdalena

    Magdalena commented on :

    For me researching disease always leaves me in awe that a super complex system such as a human cell or body, where so many things can go wrong, can work so well. In the end most of us are healthy or close to healthy, and our bodies have amazing abilities to adapt and function under changing conditions.