Nordic Life Science 1
NORDIC LIFE SCIENCE EDITOR IN CHIEF: MALIN OTMANI
LAYOUT: LISA LIDGREN, MALIN OTMANI ENGLISH PROOFREADING: LISA COCKETTE COVER PHOTO: UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRINTED BY: ÅTTA.45 2024 SCIENCE JOURNALISTS IN THIS ISSUE: ELLEN R. DELISIO PAULA PÉREZ GONZÁLEZANGUIANO ALEXANDRA HOEGBERG I HAVE ALWAYS admired those who can play chess well and really wish I learned to play when I was younger. Lucky for me I have a son who, at the moment, really enjoys the game and goes to a chess club every week. On the top floor of an old school building he dedicates hours to clever openings and creative moves together with his like-minded chess lovers. I have also read somewhere that many Nobel Prize laureates have played chess growing up, suggesting that it could improve skills required for highlevel research. Maybe that's why I'm a little extra forgiving when my son spend his time on chess.com instead of doing his homework. One of this year’s Nobel laureates in Chemistry, Sir Demis Hassabis, was an increPUBLISHING DIRECTOR: MATTIAS OLME MARKETING & SALES: MATTIAS OLME EMAIL: MATTIAS@NLSNEWS.COM PHONE: +46 8 588 941 51 COPYRIGHT 2024 BY NLS MEDIA GROUP ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART WHITHOUT PERMISSION IS PROHIBITED. A MAGAZINE FROM NLS MEDIA GROUP NLS MEDIA GROUP AB, ST PAULSGATAN 13 118 46 STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN PHONE: +46 8 588 941 51 dibly talented chess player when he was younger, and he reached Master status at the age of 13. Hassabis bought his first computer using some of his chess prize money, started programming and later became a pioneer in artificial intelligence (AI) research. At Google DeepMind Hassabis and his team developed the milestone AI programs AlphaGo and AlphaZero that focused on mastering complex board games. This year he has been honored with a Nobel Prize for the development of the game-changing protein structure prediction AI program AlphaFold2, which is already used by more than two million researchers (read more on page 46). But it all began with chess, playing and making games, states Hassabis. “Playing chess is what got me thinking about thinking, earned me the money to buy my first computer, and inspired me to code my first AI program. Amazing to reflect on how much chess shaped my life and career,” he wrote on X on International Chess Day last year. Indeed, chess and scientific innovation can be very closely linked and there are many similarities between them, like the importance of a detailed strategy, the formulation of hypotheses, the prediction of alternative scenarios, and the pursuit of understanding complex, ever-changing systems. They both require an ability to calculate shifting variables and they both require rigor. So I think I will continue to encourage my son to play. Who knows, perhaps he will even invite me to the Nobel Banquet one day. NLS WORDS FROM THE EDI TOR MALIN OTMANI Thinking about thinking MALIN OTMANI EDITOR IN CHIEF FOR DAILY LIFE SCIENCE UPDATES: NORDICLIFESCIENCE.ORG DO YOU HAVE NEWS TO SHARE? MALIN@NLSNEWS.COM PARTNERS: SUBSCRIPTION DIGITAL SUBSCRIPTION: 13 EUR/MONTH, INCLUDES: 01. THE DIGITAL ISSUES OF THE MAGAZINE 02. ACCESS TO ARCHIVE, FULLY SEARCHABLE, INCLUDING ALL PREVIOUS DIGITAL ISSUES 03. THE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER NLS NEWS AND THE MONTHLY NEWSLETTER NLS CAREERS 04. ACCESS TO ALL DIGITAL CONTENT ON NORDICLIFESCIENCE.ORG, UNLIMITED READING CALL: +46 8 588 941 51 OR SIGN UP AT: NORDICLIFESCIENCE.ORG/SUBSCRIBE