Research like you don't need the money

The nobel prize in Chemistry announced this week was given to three researchers "for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP" However there is a fourth person who had a good contribution in the work and would have been one of the winners if his research grant would not have run out.

Douglas Prasher "isolated and copied the gene that makes the mysterious Aequoria Victoria jellyfish glow."

An interesting snippet from the story-

With the bills mounting at home, he took the job driving the courtesy van for the Huntsville dealership. He said he thought driving the van would be a good way to meet people and potentially make business contacts.

"He's very overqualified for the job," Bill Penney's service director, Bob Pruitt, said Thursday. "You don't get too many biochemical engineers wanting to be your porter, but he wanted to keep himself busy doing something."

On the other hand, Neel Kashkari a 35 year old engineer turned VP at Goldman Sachs turned distributor of $700 billion bailout plan had made the wise choice.

His first and only job in engineering was working on satellite technology at TRW, a Cleveland company later bought by Northrop Grumman. But when he looked into his future, he didn't like what he saw: several more years of grad school for a PhD, then a lifetime in research and development. He decided to go into business and focus on technology, earning his MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvaniaand landing a coveted investment banking job with Goldman Sachs.

Wishing Neel good luck in his bailout effort and hope Doug Prasher gets a more satisfying job soon.