Page 175 - Neutrons for Sciences and Society

both saw that European biologists would benefit by joining forces to keep Europe competitive as the nuclear physicists had done. They invited Jim Watson and John Kendrew to come and discuss this on their return from receiving their Nobel prizes in Stockholm. From this was born the idea of a European molecular biology laboratory, which would naturally find its place next
to CERN, the two forming the first steps towards a European scientific university. A private company, EMBO, the European Molecular Biology Organisation was established.
In 1964 Szilárd died, and Kendrew found himself alone on
the project. The departure of Weisskopf from CERN left the Geneva site less attractive, since his successor did not share his interests. Kendrew attached great importance to the proximity of physicists. In 1970 a site was proposed at Heidelberg by Germany. Wolfgang Gentner was in Heidelberg, a nuclear physicist who
had worked with Maier-Leibnitz when the laboratory was led by Bothe. Gentner’s acts during the war had been remarkable (he
had managed to obtain the release of Paul Langevin, who had been taken hostage). The site at Heidelberg was good but not comparable with a location adjacent to CERN.
Such was the situation when Kendrew came with his committee to visit Grenoble and the ILL. Kendrew was struck by the strength of physics, notably solid-state, in Grenoble. Now the physics
of solids is fundamentally of greater interest to biologists than nuclear physics. At the end of the visit he explained to me that the site at CERN was no longer a possibility, and he didn’t have great enthusiasm for the location at Heidelberg. He found the Grenoble site perfect (France had proposed Nice), and he asked me to go
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Chapter 7 - Maturity