Bonnie Bassler

We mostly don't get sick. Most often, bacteria are keeping us well. ”

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. ”

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. ”

I am lucky because I get to work with the smartest, most creative, and most devoted group of students and postdoctoral fellows imaginable. ”

I think being open-minded about what Nature is trying to tell you is the key to being creative and successful. ”

When antibiotics first came out, nobody could have imagined we'd have the resistance problem we face today. We didn't give bacteria credit for being able to change and adapt so fast. ”

We're scientists; we're curious about how nature works, but we're also do-gooders. It's fantastic to think that the same experiments we'd do to understand how information gets into cells could have a practical side to them, too. ”

My job is to teach someone something they never knew, but it should not be like you're in a prisoner-of-war camp. I'm supposed to be teaching you but also entertaining you. You're giving me an hour of your time. It should be lively. We're on a hunt, it's a mystery, and it's amazing. ”

By weight, you are more human than bacteria, because your cells are bigger, but by numbers, it's not even close. ”

Bacteria are single-celled organisms. Bacteria are the model organisms for everything that we know in higher organisms. There are 10 times more bacterial cells in you or on you than human cells. ”