2025 Haldane Lecture

The 2025 Haldane Lecture will be delivered by Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser, Regius Professor of Botany at the University of Cambridge and CEO of UK Research and Innovation.

The lecture will be livestreamed, link to follow.

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Title: Science: changing the story

Abstract: People think in linear narratives, with a beginning followed by a series of causal events, leading to a conclusion. This is a useful way to think, but only if you are able to keep in mind that it is often not what is actually happening. Many natural science disciplines are focused on understanding dynamic, multi-scale systems that do not have a beginning, a middle and an end. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

Most scientists have to navigate this challenge when writing a paper up for publication. It is essential to tell a story to bring readers along with the data you are presenting and how you are interpreting them. The arc you present often bears little relation to how you conducted the work, which involved twists and turns, serendipitous discoveries, and the putting together of two things you had not previously connected.

Meanwhile, everyone, including scientists, live in a world with dominant stories about who does science and how science works. Simplifying only slightly, this often centres on a lone genius, using pure logic and brilliant inspiration to march toward the truth and save the world. All these science stories are problematic for everyone. They restrict who does science, and how it interacts with society and with wider human endeavours, at a time when technological advance is proceeding at lightening pace.

Changing the science story has become an urgent priority in successfully capturing the opportunities and addressing the challenges we face, locally, nationally and globally.

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About the speaker: Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser DBE FRS is the Chief Executive of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and Regius Professor of Botany at the University of Cambridge.

UKRI brings together the UK’s research councils, Innovate UK and Research England, operating with a combined budget of more than £8 billion each year.

Prior to this Ottoline Leyser was Director of the Sainsbury Laboratory, University of Cambridge, an interdisciplinary research institute combining computational modelling with molecular genetics and cell biology to elucidate the dynamical systems underpinning the control of plant growth and development. She has made important contributions to understanding the role of plant hormones in developmental plasticity, using the control of shoot branching in Arabidopsis as a model system.

Ottoline has a long-term interest in research culture and its effects on the quality and effectiveness of the research system. She chaired the Nuffield Council on Bioethics project examining these issues and has been actively engaged in work aimed at generating a more inclusive, creative and connected culture. She has worked extensively in science policy.

She is a Fellow of the Royal Society, a Member of the Leopoldina and EMBO, and an International Member of the US National Academy of Sciences. In 2017 she was appointed DBE for services to plant science, science in society and equality and diversity in science.