It all started on in the town of Boston Massachusetts. A young bright eyed Richard ( or Dick as his friends call him) Brennan began his academic career at the University of Boston. Science was not his first interest as some might assume but early on in his studies he was drawn to language and history. He was particularity interested in french and colonial history, passions that to this day he explores in his free time. His was dissuaded from these fields and also had a strong passion for biology (his major) and chemistry. After graduating from his undergrad program he decided to peruse graduate school at the University of Cornell, but as the nature of many great scientists they find that the first time you try something if often not the best path. He quickly decided that Cornell although a great school could only be described in one word “Grey” quickly assessing that he needed a change of scenery he worked in a lab for a few years then transferred to the University of Wisconsin Madison. There he completed his Ph.D and was quickly recruited as a Postdoc on the wild west coast at the University of Oregon. He quickly found that academia was his calling so after his Postdoc he was hired at the Oregon school of medicine and was there for 16 years. After his time there he moved to work in Texas for 6 years before coming to the best school in the nation our very own Duke University, where he is now the chair of the Biochemistry department.
His goals include trying to solve the problem of Multi-Drug resistance in bacteria along with determining high resolution structures of many important proteins. Factors such as bio films and dormant drug persistent cells are of special interest to him. Teaching is of great interest to him shaping the young minds of prospective scientists is one of his many strengths. He believes that the challenging but interesting part of being a professor is integrating that teaching and research portions of the job.
He shared with me that his favorite part of being a scientist is being paid to think. Not many jobs are you able to really do that and it is for that reason he enjoys what he does so much. The worst part of science in his eyes is the networking that might let someone move ahead without the proper qualifications. He strongly believes that each scientist should be weighed with mainly merit in mind. His most embarrassing moment in his lab experiment was accidentally spilling a sample because he looked at his watch. He never wore a watch again. I have never trusted watches this just further confirms my suspicions. If nothing else take away this , Never trust a watch.
Learn more about the man, the myth, the legend….. http://dukebrennanlab.com/index.html
