• Question: what do you think is the most important topic in science

    Asked by sahir to Aime, Akshat, Diana, Gemma, Judith on 13 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Judith McCann

      Judith McCann answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      Medical, of course I’m going to say Biomaterials :p but also physics to understand the fundamentals of life

    • Photo: Gemma Sharp

      Gemma Sharp answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      I think that’s a really good question, but very difficult to answer, because everyone will have different ideas of what’s important.

      Is it more important to find out how to cure cancer, or to find renewable energy sources, or save a species from dying out? It’s really difficult to tell. They’re all important for different reasons.

      There are topics the government sees as being more important, because they give more money to people wanting to do medical research than to other areas of science like zoology. They tend to give money to projects that have more of a direct impact on human lives.

      It’s difficult to say whether or not that’s right, but I definitely think medical research is very important.

    • Photo: Aimé Fournier

      Aimé Fournier answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      When I started as an undergraduate I thought the answer would be, cosmology (the shape and destiny of the large-scale universe). When I started as a graduate student I thought, particle physics (the properties of matter and energy at fantastically subatomic scales). Then I changed to weather and climate because they’re fascinating and daily relevant. Climate change may wipe out humans if we don’t understand and respond to it much better than we have up to now.

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