By IANS,
London: Indian-origin scientist Venkatraman Ramakrishan Wednesday said that he is “honoured” to share 2009 Nobel Prize for Chemistry but added that it’s a “mistake to define good work by awards”.
Asked about his initial reaction when he heard the news, Venkatraman said: “Well, I think it’s a great honour and surprise! I am very happy!”
“I think it’s a mistake to define good work by awards. This is a typical mistake that the public or even the press make. None of you called me about my work even two days ago…right?” Ramakrishnan told BBC Hindi Service in an exclusive interview on phone from Cambridge, Britain.
“I think people have to do what interests (them) and then pursue it…that’s the way to do important work. Whether prizes come your way or not, it’s really not so important.”
Ramakrishnan, who is now a US citizen, was named for the $1.42-million award along with American Thomas A. Steitz and Israeli Ada E. Yonath for their “studies of the structure and function of the ribosome”, which is found in cells with nuclei and translates the DNA code into life.
He also said that India has many promising scientists but the press seemed to be “hung up on Western awards like the Nobel”.
“There are lots of good scientists in India but I notice the press is hung up about these Western prizes like the Nobel Prize instead of appreciating the excellent work they (scientists) are doing within the context of India,” he said.
Venkatraman was born in Chidambaram town in Tamil Nadu and left for the US after his graduation in 1971. When asked about Western countries still being the destination of Indian youths trying to fulfil their dreams of higher research, Venkataraman’s reply was very candid.
“No, no I don’t feel that it is necessary any more. There are lots of good labs in India where they can do excellent work. Well, in 1971 there were only a few places in India – there was not much research and money for research in India at that time.”
“I have been to India several times since and these days there are some really fantastic places in India like the Indian Institute of Science and several others…those are very good places and very good scientists,” Ramakrishnan, 57, said.
Talking about his student days, the scientist with MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge said: “In my days, the choices were rather limited. So the US was, and still is, the world centre for science, although Europe and UK are not comparable…so in those days I chose to go to the US. But to do the kind of work I wanted to do, I chose to come to Cambridge because the MRC Lab of microbiology has a long standing tradition of supporting difficult fundamental work”.
When asked about the implications of his work, Venkatraman said: “My work is about the fundamental molecular machine that translates genetic code into protein so it’s essential to understand life – it’s one of the central problems in life…how genetic info is used to make protein. For that reason it’s important. Many anti-biotics bind to ribosomes.”
“And with these structures people have been able to see how these anti-biotics bind and that helps them to design new anti-biotics. This is one of the implications,” he said.