SFS News: N-Prize Founder, Dr. Paul Dear Talks to SFS

I recently got talking to Blair Gordon of Generation Space, he had begun telling me how they had entered into a new space prize called the “N-Prizeâ€

Looks like Paul is on The Space Show this week!

4. Sunday, March 15, 2009, 12-1:30 PM PST (20-21:30 GMT)
Dr. Paul Dear, founder and creator of the N-prize, returns. Dr. Paul Dear was born in Surrey, England - his mother’s American, and his father (now deceased) was English; he grew up in Hampshire (southern England). He did Natural Sciences (basically a mix of biology, chemistry and math) at Cambridge University, then did a PhD. in molecular biology at Oxford. He now works at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, which is a part of the UK Medical Research Council (a government-funded research organization, roughly equivalent to the NIH in the ‘States). The LMB is the lab where Crick and Watson discovered the DNA double helix, and the lab has about a dozen Nobel prizewinners. He currently leads a research team in genomics (DNA-based research) working on things ranging from cancer to ancient DNA (mammoths). He says “I’ve always been drawn towards physics and engineering, though I don’t have a degree in either. My attitude in general is that complex problems can be solved by a combination of naive optimism and ingenuity, rather than by money and big resources alone. The N-Prize started out as an idea of mine on the Halfbakery (www.halfbakery.com), a website where people bounce around crazy ideas. I posted the N-Prize there, initially as a hypothetical exercise. But, after some arguing back and forth, I figured it might actually be possible, so I put up the prize money and launched the website.

Should be a good listen!

Yes, encourage people to ring in if you are able too, I'm going to try. should be good listening!



Iain

well done on the show guys
Lots of familiar names!

Great Job Paul! That was really great. Sorry I studdered but I'm not used to being on the raido The show went great good job!

Monroe