Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Essay
  • Published:

How lucky can one be? A perspective from a young scientist at the right place at the right time

Nature Medicine volume 18, pages 1486–1488 (2012)Cite this article

Subjects

How amazing to receive a call that I, along with my friends and colleagues James Spudich and Michael Sheetz, won the Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. An important part of the research cited for the Lasker Award stems from a time when I was a graduate student. I was 21 years old when I first met Jim Spudich while applying to MD-PhD programs, 23 when Mike Sheetz, Tom Reese, Bruce Schnapp and I began work on axonal transport, 25 when our papers on microtubule-based transport and kinesin were published and 27 when I started my first job at UCSF. It was an extraordinary period of time. I was at the right place at the right time, hanging on tight, and enjoying the scientific ride of my life. This essay is aimed at young scientists who are starting their own journeys. I will provide a perspective and ten lessons learned from my own experiences in graduate school and travels to the discovery of kinesin.

An abbreviated history of my journey to Woods Hole and kinesin

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1

References

  1. Sheetz, M.P. & Spudich, J.A. Movement of myosin-coated fluorescent beads on actin cables in vitro. Nature 303, 31–35 (1983).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Brady, S.T., Lasek, R.J. & Allen, R.D. Fast axonal transport in extruded axoplasm from squid giant axon. Science 218, 1129–1131 (1982).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Allen, R.D., Metuzals, J., Tasaki, I., Brady, S.T. & Gilbert, S.P. Fast axonal transport in squid giant axon. Science 218, 1127–1129 (1982).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Barber, R.T. & Chavez, F.P. Biological consequences of El Niño. Science 222, 1203–1210 (1983).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Schnapp, B.J., Vale, R.D., Sheetz, M.P. & Reese, T.S. Single microtubules from squid axoplasm support bidirectional movement of organelles. Cell 40, 455–462 (1985).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Vale, R.D., Schnapp, B.J., Reese, T.S. & Sheetz, M.P. Movement of organelles along filaments dissociated from the axoplasm of the squid giant axon. Cell 40, 449–454 (1985).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Vale, R.D., Schnapp, B.J., Reese, T.S. & Sheetz, M.P. Organelle, bead, and microtubule translocations promoted by soluble factors from the squid giant axon. Cell 40, 559–569 (1985).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Vale, R.D., Reese, T.S. & Sheetz, M.P. Identification of a novel force-generating protein, kinesin, involved in microtubule-based motility. Cell 42, 39–50 (1985).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Vale, R.D. et al. Different axoplasmic proteins generate movement in opposite directions along microtubules in vitro. Cell 43, 623–632 (1985).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Paschal, B.M. & Vallee, R.B. Retrograde transport by the microtubule-associated protein MAP 1C. Nature 330, 181–183 (1987).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank my family, my laboratory, my UCSF colleagues, my worldwide scientific friends, the NIH and HHMI, all of whom provided me with their unique support over the years.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ronald D. Vale is in the Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), University of California–San Francisco (UCSF), San Francisco, California, USA.,

    Ronald D Vale

Authors
  1. Ronald D Vale
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ronald D Vale.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing financial interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Vale, R. How lucky can one be? A perspective from a young scientist at the right place at the right time. Nat Med 18, 1486–1488 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm.2925

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nm.2925

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing