Transcriber: Einat Sprinzak Reviewer: Denise RQ
My friends at work know
I have a sixth sense.
It all started when I was a kid.
I was very curious one day to understand
what does "hot" or "cold" really mean?
I went to my father, to my mother, to my brother, and to my sisters,
and asked them, "How does it really work?"
It took years until I really got it.
This might surprise you.
It's not a question of feelings. It's all about numbers.
You see, it's about 10% difference in how fast the molecules move
between the steaming hot chocolate and the ice pop.
But what I have learnt from that
is that in order to understand nature deeply,
you have to pay close attention to the numbers.
The kid in me was finally happy.
But by then, I became interested in knowing more,
trying to understand, for example,
how molecules moving around in your body do something
so miraculous as enabling you to be able to see or to hear.
How does eating your morning cereal give you the energy
in order to be able to do something just like smiling right now?
Sorry, I meant right now!
(Laughter)
So today I'd like to share with you
how in order to understand the magic of life
we have to look at the numbers.
If you want to understand our cells,
you have to walk into the world of molecular biology.
It is a world of great promise.
When we are trying to prevent cancer
it's all about trying to understand and stop mutations
that happen in this molecular world.
And it's not only about preventing disease.
In the next 15 years,
there are going to be a billion more people to feed on planet Earth.
We, scientists, want to recreate the success of the green revolution;
it happened in the 1960s and 1970s
and tripled the yields of corn, of wheat, of rice.
Molecular biology has the capability
to enable us to recreate that success,
without, of course, needing to cut down all of our forests
in order to make more fields.
But we have a big problem in this world of tiny things.
You see, we do not understand our cells well enough.
Trying to work in molecular biology
could feel like you are working in this very strange world.
And what do we usually do when we are in a new environment?
We try to rely on our intuition, right?
But our intuition can often fail us
in this very difficult and strange world.
Let me give you an example,
What are we made of? We are made of cells, right?
But what kind of cells?
Is it mostly muscle cells? Skin cells?
If you do the counting - and we scientists love to count -
you find that about 70% of the cells in my body
are red blood cells.
And not only in me, also in you.
But most of the cells in our body
are not actually our human cells.
Bacteria are about a hundred times smaller
than even the relatively tiny, red blood cells.
And so, in each one of us,
there's about two fold more bacteria than human cells.
We, scientists, still try to find out exactly by how much are we outnumbered.
But we already understand that you should probably care.
Why is that?
Because now there is an explosion of research
showing for example, that the bacteria, in your cells, in your body,
could have a strong effect on whether you will be thin or overweight.
And I am giving you that example
because it shows how our intuition can mislead us,
even about our very own body.
So what could help us try to understand this better?
I like to think about it with an analogy.
Let's think of an alien arriving on planet Earth
and wanting to understand our society better.
It could decide, for example, to read our Constitution.
But would that give insight into how our daily lives actually work?
Probably not.
So what book would you recommend that the alien reads
in order to understand our daily lives?
Any suggestions?
Maybe the newspaper?
(Audience) The Bible. Ron Milo: Maybe the Bible?
(Audience) Harry Potter. RM: Harry Potter?
(Audience) Fifty shades of grey. RM: Fifty shades of grey?
(Laughter)
I suggest
our alien reads the report of the Bureau of Statistics.
(Laughter)
You see, numbers in that report
will tell the alien
when are we expected to get married,
how many kids we will probably have,
and what will we die of in the end.
It would also say how many hours does it take us to commute to work,
how many hours are we spending watching TV,
and what do we like to eat while we are doing all that.
So, [for] the past 7 years, I am on a mission.
I'm trying to build the report of the Bureau of Statistics
of molecular biology.
It all started when I was still a postgraduate student
at the Harvard Medical School.
I was sitting together with Mike and Paul, two of the most brilliant researchers,
and we were trying to play around with some cool idea that we had.
It was about this fantastic machine that we have in the cells of our body,
and we needed to know how many copies does it have,
and how fast does it work.
We were sure it was measured before,
but intensive googling did not give us the answer.
Neither did the huge library.
At that point I decided
I am going to start my own little collection of bionumbers,
useful numbers in biology,
and that I will make it available online to anyone who is interested.
I had no clue what I was getting into.
You see, that small collection that I made freely available
turned into a database that now has thousands of entries
and more than half a million searches
done by researchers from hundreds of universities throughout the world.
I can see how people go there and get some insight
into why did it happen that it spread like wildfire?
You see, scientists try to get meaning
in this alien world we are trying to study.
Bionumbers enable us to understand this world better
because it gives us meaning.
It shows what does it mean
to be small or large,
to be fast or slow,
to be strong or weak,
and through this meaning we could be more effective in our research.
I can already see how people wanting to make a mathematical model of cancer,
go and find information
on how big the cells are,
how fast they divide,
how quickly mutations occur,
and what the energy source that feeds those cells is.
I find that through these numbers, I am getting a sixth sense,
in order to be able to understand the things we are studying.
But a scientist, especially a biologist,
saying he has a sixth sense,
could get him into trouble with his colleagues.
Imagine yourself walking around campus and saying,
"I have a sixth sense."
What would your colleagues think about you?
Well, as it turns out, I am in a good company.
Our hero, Charles Darwin, wrote in his autobiography:
"In later life,
I wish I studied more mathematics
because people with that proficiency
seem to have an extra sense to understand the world."
But you may ask: "How long does it take to acquire a sixth sense?
The students in the course I teach
at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel,
"Cell Biology by the Numbers,"
tell me they started with five senses
and by the end of the semester, they had a sixth sense.
For the final assignment
they had to choose a question
that interested them for their research, or for life.
Let me give you a few examples.
One student was asking:
"How many molecules
of the deadly toxin that's in Botox
would kill you
whereas how many would solve the wrinkles on your face?
Another student was asking:
How many glasses of ice-cold water do I have to drink
in order to lose weight?
The thought being that our body will have to burn calories to heat up the water
and by that you lose weight.
Well, the short answer: way too much;
much more than your body can safely handle.
So please don't try it at home.
[But these examples also show] how very often we find out
that an hour of thinking
and using the numbers to analyze problems
can often save us months, or even years,
of experiments or hard work in the research [field].
You can probably tell why I was happy.
I saw that it was not about just transmitting knowledge,
it was about giving a new perspective,
a new tool in order to perceive the world.
And I want to be able to give that tool to many other people as well.
Together with Prof. Rob Phillips from Caltech,
we are writing a collection of questions
that we will make available online.
We started from a question that was asked by another student in the course:
"How similar am I,
in terms of my book of instructions,
- the DNA in my body -
to some random person I meet on the street?
Well, as it turns out,
we are, and you are,
about 99% identical in terms of your DNA
to the person just next to you.
Our brains are very good
at detecting very, very tiny differences,
and we all like to think about ourselves as very, very special,
but to the alien, we are probably quite similar -
- we all have one nose, two eyes, two legs, we all love to talk.
Numbers enable us to see those similarities better.
My mentor at Harvard,
Prof. Marc Kirschner, once told me:
"Trying to understand molecular biology without the numbers
is like trying to understand history without knowing geography."
Just like geography gives you insight
into why did history unfold the way it did,
numbers enable us to navigate
in the strange terrain of molecular biology,
and get meaning and better understanding
in the research that we are doing.
I do not yet fully know the full synergy
between molecular biology and numbers,
but I can already see in the searches done
that people are using that in order to fight against disease,
to be able to understand better the cells in our body,
both the human and the bacterial,
and to find ways in order to feed more people
while keeping the health of our planet.
So, next time a kid comes up to you
and asks you, "What are we made of?"
I suggest that beyond trying to help him get the best information we have,
also help him enjoy playing with those numbers;
[because] you are giving that kid a real advantage in our world,
you are developing that kid's sixth sense.
Thank you.
(Applause)