Bonnie Bassler
Bonnie Bassler
Bonnie Lynn Bassler is an American molecular biologist. She has been a professor at Princeton University since 1994. In 2002, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScientist
CountryUnited States of America
experiment later life maybe minutes run ten
It's a manic-depressive life. You run in here, you open your incubator, your experiment makes no sense, you think, 'I hate this job.' Then ten minutes later you think, 'Well, now, maybe I'll try this or I'll try that.' You do it because you know there will be an 'a-ha!' day.
iron rocks bacteria
Bacteria mineralized the rocks; they deposited the iron. They made the geology we see.
war quality world
When antibiotics became industrially produced following World War II, our quality of life and our longevity improved enormously. No one thought bacteria were going to become resistant.
successful thinking keys
I think being open-minded about what Nature is trying to tell you is the key to being creative and successful.
goal moments scientist
The goal of scientists is you hope that the thing you're working on is bigger than the thing you're pipetting into that tube at the moment.
motivation inspiration differences
[Bacteria] have an incredibly complicated chemical lexicon that ... allows bacteria to be multicellular. In the spirit of TED they're doing things together because it makes a difference.
motivation inspiration thinking
You think of yourselves as human beings, but I think of you as 99 percent bacterial.
dark bacteria humans
My bacteria glow in the dark - no human being doesn't like that.
allowed bigger figuring lab mystery realized spend
I realized that lab research was the perfect path for me. It allowed me to spend every day figuring out mysteries/puzzles that have to do with what make us alive. What could be a bigger mystery or puzzle?
devoted fellows group lucky students work
I am lucky because I get to work with the smartest, most creative, and most devoted group of students and postdoctoral fellows imaginable.
mystery solving
As a kid, I loved doing puzzles, solving riddles, and reading mystery books. I also loved animals and always had pets.
eventually infectious kinds measles population relationship time
Think about all kinds of infectious diseases, like mumps or measles or chicken pox. When a virgin population encountered those pathogens, it ravaged the population, and now they're childhood diseases, and eventually they won't even be that. That's our relationship with bacteria, going through time.
enormous groups organize themselves
In my lab, we are always thinking about how cells, bacterial cells, can talk to each other and then organize themselves into enormous groups that function in unison.
allow bacteria bad coat digest food foods protect proteins skin
All these bacteria that coat our skin and live in our intestines, they fend off bad bacteria. They protect us. And you can't even digest your food without the bacteria that are in your gut. They have enzymes and proteins that allow you to metabolize foods you eat.