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An interview with Nobel laureate professor Randy W. Schekman
Randy W. Schekman: Traditionally in the US, a lot of attention has been paid to science competitions. At a young age, this is how I got into science. In the US, they have science fairs at schools. Students get to do individual projects with their own designs, and they put them on display for the school community. And usually, there are awards and prizes that they get in this kind of competition. This evolved over many years in the US to the point of becoming quite organized where the winners from the school go to the district-level contest and if they keep winning,they then to the state contest, and then to the national contest. One of the great Chinese-American scholars, Roger Yonchien Tsien of a family from Hangzhou, won the top prize when he was 16 years old. He was just a genius, and he went on subsequently to win the Nobel Prize. Winning a science fair doesn't mean that you automatically win the Nobel Prize, but it's a really good way to encourage young kids who have a curiosity about the world to do their own exploration. I'm pretty sure this still goes on in the US and I've been asked to serve as a judge in some of these fairs. And I think it's something that could be done here in China too, because it really encourages independent curiosity and the development of independent curiosity. It gets away from the traditional teacher and textbook and curriculum. And it serves to encourage people to do their own thing, which I think is a good thing. Reporter: What do you think are the key elements in fostering excellent medical talents? Randy W. Schekman: Well, in the US, again, in the universities, certainly at my institution, the University of California, Berkeley, the students who study medicine are going to go on to medical school. So, in the US you go to university first, and then, for those who are interested in the medical curriculum, you then go to a medical school. But in the US, most of the students who major in pre-medical seek opportunities to work in individual research laboratories. They have real hands-on experience doing really professional-level science. I've always had many undergraduates in my lab, even though they don't have enough time to work on a project that would result in publication, it's good training for them, and it's good training for my advanced students to learn how to teach younger people. Right now, I have eight undergraduate research students in my lab. It's very busy with these students who are only part-time in the lab. But I think it's excellent training even for those who don't go into research but who go into clinical practice. It's good to know how much time and trouble it is to discover something new and to finally produce enough results to publish a paper. It's very challenging. And I think clinicians should have this experience to develop an appreciation of how much effort goes into making a discovery that they will eventually use in the clinic. Reporter: Have you ever collaborated with students of Generation Z? Please share your experience. Randy W. Schekman: Not only do I have them in the lab, but I teach a class to first- year university students, who are 17 and 18 years old. It's called a freshman seminar and I teach it based on subjects of my research interest. And I also teach second-year university students who are now 18 and 19 years old. I teach Introductory Biology, and that's a huge class, 600 or more students. So, I have had many interactions with Generation Z students. Reporter: What unique advantages have Generation Z students demonstrated to help them standout in future scientific and technological research? Randy W. Schekman: What I'll tell you now is not unique to Generation Z, it's always true with younger generations. Younger people are always more technically facile because they have younger minds, and they can learn things more quickly. For new technological developments or new developments in media exposure that I have no experience with and don't even have an interest in, young people know this and it's second nature to them — access to websites, facilities with laptops, and cell phones. I mean I sort of fumble around, but they're much faster. So what's true of any younger generation is that they will have more technical facilities. But what I would say about the younger generation, again, I don't think this is necessarily Generation Z, but just in general, in science and scholarship, there's more of an acceptance that there is equality between men and women in their career aspirations. When I started as a faculty member in Berkeley many years ago, there were almost no women in the faculty. In our graduate program, the PhD students were equal men and women. But the women just dropped out for one reason or another, and they never went on to advance to faculty positions. At the time, there was beginning to be a very sincere effort to try to encourage women to take higher level positions and it very slowly succeeded to the point where now we don't have to make any effort, because in my department, we hire equal numbers of men and women without even trying. There are more women who really want to aspire to an independent career. And for that to work, the men have to be more willing to take responsibility if they want to have a family. So, it's not uncommon when a couple has a child for the man to take time off from work, take a sabbatical or take a leave of absence to stay home with the child as well as the woman. So, there's more equal respect for the career aspirations of women. It's not fully there yet, but it's much better. And that is true not just of Generation Z but of just the generations younger than me. Reporter: What is your view on English as a lingua franca and primary working language in the scientific field? Randy W. Schekman: Well, I feel very fortunate that English is my native language because I had great difficulty learning German when I was in university. But all the people who come to my lab from abroad — and I have many Chinese graduate students and postdoctoral fellows — all have to speak English. They know they have to write their publications in English. Some are better than others. But they all aspire to master the English language both in writing and speaking. So, although in my lab I'm sure that some of the Chinese students speak Mandarin to each other, generally they speak English. English as a lingua franca can help us overcome communication barriers caused by different languages. Reporter: In the digital age, AI is beginning to show great potential to replace human translators. In terms of cross-cultural communication, the medical community used to rely relatively heavily on language workers. So, what direction do you think translation education should develop in order to better assist future medical research and keep up with the progress in the medical field? Randy W. Schekman: Well, there's no doubt that AI will be used. It's already being used in science. In my general area of biology, AI has a very important role in helping scientists understand huge data sets that otherwise would be very difficult to interpret. But in language, I think probably people who aren't as facile in English will use AI to help them write publications and that's fine. But these people still have to speak. They have to communicate. I think it will be much better if they continue to master English as the lingua franca in order to be able to communicate and teach. I don't think computers or AI are going to replace the human voice anytime soon for teaching. And I would be very concerned if foreign scholars suddenly used AI as a crutch rather than learning English themselves. I can't predict the future, but I think there's still going to be a lot of need for language and translation and language education. 关键词：英语 科学研究 |
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