By Shakiba Ghasemi
In connection with the first Rellu Café Scientifique I also had the opportunity to interview professor Howy Jacobs. Professor Jacobs was interviewed together with Kaarina Ojasti, a now retired biology teacher in Rellu.
The interviewees discussed how they organized the first Café Scientifique in Tampere. The café offered people of all ages an insight into science.
Howy Jacobs was born and raised in London. With some work experience at Cambridge University and Glasgow University, listed in his CV, he moved to Finland in 1996 to serve as a researcher and university professor at the University of Tampere. The main reason was that Howy was looking for a more research-like atmosphere and he saw better research opportunities in Finland, whilst in England, the atmosphere was more educational at that time.
One of the latest projects which Howy conducts is about the production of heat in mitochondrion. He has given a funny title to his research subject, “Mitochondrion is not as Cool as We Thought!” Meanwhile, he has conducted another project on the alternative oxidase system. This system involves the extraction of a specific gene from and then this gene is inserted into an organism, which lacks that particular gene, such as fruit flies. This gene alters some manners of the fruit flies which it did not have before, however, it does also make male fruit flies have a harder time reproducing.
Howy also voiced the biggest personal challenge, which is to fully trust the fresh researchers in projects, despite their motivations and fresh minds. His biggest global challenge is the growing impact of non-scientific views on peoples’ minds, creating some misinformation or superstition.
A big thank you to both Howy Jacobs and Kaarina Ojasti for their time to answer the questions both about themselves and the history of Café Scientifique.
©Erica Numminen: Howy and Kaarina interviewed by Shakiba at Tampereen Lyseon Lukio.