“When I got my Nobel prize, I didn’t have to ask for a TV, I was just sent one to my office”

Here are some (maybe a bit late) thoughts from both of your MRS bloggers about the plenary session on Monday with Dr Bawendi.

Gabriele: For the past 10 years I was extremely interested in nanomaterials and nanotechnology as anything of that tiny scale really fascinates me and today, I had an amazing honour to hear a lecture by Moungi G. Bawendi. The inspiration from Moungi, the jokes about TVs and a quick chat afterwards has motivated me even more to aim higher for materials, especially for all the “cool” materials. And made me feel better knowing that you could win a Nobel prize even after a long period of time without publications.

Rhys: Unlike Gabriele, this was my first run-in with a Nobel laureate. Dr. Bawendi gave a fantastic seminar about how spending a lot of time on some fundamental science had a tremendous impact on our technology today. His first paper at MIT as a young professor (who had gone 3 years without a paper) is the one that won him the Nobel Prize in Chemistry last year. Our TVs and screens have continuously become more uncannily lifelike. We have QDs and researchers like Dr. Bawendi to thank for that. I think he's earned his right to not have to pay for QLED/OLED screens anymore.