I first became aware of Charles Darwin and evolution while still a schoolboy growing up in Chicago. My father and I had a passion for bird-watching, and when the snow or the rain kept me indoors, I read his bird books and learned about evolution.

One-third of all female infertility is the result of blocked fallopian tubes. If fertilization could be done in the lab and then the fertilized egg implanted in the womb, it would get around that problem. Millions of women who cannot have children would suddenly be able to.

I never could read science fiction. I was just uninterested in it. And you know, I don't like to read novels where the hero just goes beyond what I think could exist. And it doesn't interest me because I'm not learning anything about something I'll actually have to deal with.

It is extraordinary the extent to which Darwin's insights not only changed his contemporaries' view of the world but also continue to be a source of great intellectual stimulation for scientists and nonscientists alike.

In the spring of 1959, I received an offer of a professorship at Harvard, which I accepted with alacrity since I wanted to be near my family and since the chemistry department at Harvard was unsurpassed.

The idea that science is just some luxury that you'll get around to if you can afford it is regressive to any future a country might dream for itself.

If I can get some student interested in science, if I can show members of the general public what's going on up there in the space program, then my job's been done.

It turns out that understanding the British public is not rocket science. The British appreciate honesty and they also have a bonkers, off-the-wall sense of humour like me.