First of all, many human diseases are influenced by, if not caused by mutations in genes.

The glimpses of human strength and frailty that a physician sees are with me still.

At every stage of my career I have had interesting and cordial colleagues, some of whom are close friends.

My education began in the public schools of Wilmington. During most of these years, from about age 10, I also worked at some job or other after school, on weekends, and in the summer months.

And of course, identifying all human genes and proteins will have great medical significance.

People are not the only interesting organism on earth. From the point of view of scientific or commercial value, there are lots of interesting organisms.

My parents came to the United States in the early years of this century as part of a wave of Russian Jewish immigrants seeking freedom and opportunity in the New World.

As I look back on the last few decades of my life, I am struck by the good fortune that came my way.

Think. In a minute from now you could be saying, I risked death. I threw for life, and I won life. It is a very wonderful feeling. To have survived.

History is like a constantly changing tree.

I feel successful when the writing goes well. This lasts five minutes. Once when I was on the bestseller list I also felt successful. That lasted three minutes.

Software comes from heaven when you have good hardware.

I prefer empty cages, Sabina, until I find a unique bird I once saw in my dreams.

There's nothing of any importance in life-except how well you do your work.

Legacy leaders are the only ones wiling to pay the price to fix a broken culture.

Children can write poetry and then, unless they're poets, they stop when reach puberty.

Natural gas is a bridge fuel. But it's not a bridge - it's a gangplank. It's either a bridge in space or a bridge in time. The bridge in time we don't need. We have renewable technology right now.

I would prefer to remain in prison for another 20 years than bargain my beliefs for freedom.