开挂人生！诺贝尔化学奖得主是个“酷姐”

2022-10-12 04:10

凌晨两点，卡罗琳·贝尔托西（Carolyn Bertozzi）被一阵电话声吵醒，当她昏昏沉沉地接起电话时，传入耳中的正是诺贝尔奖委员会的恭喜。

Carolyn R. Bertozzi was shocked — and groggy — when she received the call from the Nobel Prize committee shortly before 2 am.

诺贝尔化学奖得主图源：推特

2022年10月5号，诺贝尔化学奖公布。有三位科学家因为在点击化学（Click Chemistry）和生物正交化学（Bioorthogonal Chemistry）领域作出的贡献，共同获得了诺贝尔化学奖。获奖者中，出现了一位女性的身影。

卡罗琳教授回忆起时说：“在我熟睡的时候，电话响了起来。凌晨两点有电话打来实在有点奇怪，但我还是接通了。”当得知这个喜讯时，她说：“我还以为是我在做梦或是幻觉，但我马上意识到这一切都是真实的，我差点激动地晕了过去！”

"I was asleep and the phone rang, so I had to shake it off and try and figure out what was going on. And then it seemed a bit surreal," Bertozzi says.

"You know, I was thinking it was some strange hallucination or dream or something. But when I finally realized that, yes, I really was on the phone with the chair of the Nobel Committee and his colleagues and they were congratulating me, I just went into shock. I think I might have stopped breathing for a minute."

获奖后的自拍图源：推特

就这样，即将56岁的卡罗琳·贝尔托西成为了诺贝尔百年历史上，第八位获得化学奖的女科学家。而她的身份不仅是“化学家”这么简单……

“重金属音乐”之路

卡罗琳出生在一个学霸家庭，父亲是麻省理工大学物理学教授，母亲也在麻省理工任职，这让她从小就受到了学术的熏陶。但是卡罗琳在哈佛大学读书时，却产生了主修音乐的念头。

US chemist Carolyn Bertozzi reckons her path into science was almost subconscious. Her dad was a physics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology but when she started at nearby Harvard University she was tempted to major in music.

卡罗琳观看音乐演出图源：推特

但“不幸”的是，这个主意很快就被父母一票否决了，理由是卡罗琳的表弟也曾经有一个音乐梦，但现如今却在银行工作来支付房租。她最终还是没敢选择音乐，而是成为了一名医学预科生。

"That was unpopular with my parents – a cousin had pursued a career in music and ended up working in a bank to pay the rent," she says. "I was a little timid about defying them."

Instead, she chose the pre-med track that included classes in maths and the sciences.

图源：Chemistry World

进入大学后，她仍然对音乐保持着热爱，成为了一支重金属乐队的键盘手。乐队的名字“Bored of Education”也十分“叛逆”，翻译过来就是“厌学”。她的乐队队友汤姆·莫雷洛（Tom Morello），正是摇滚界的牛人，乐队暴力反抗机器（Rage Against the Machine）的传奇吉他手。

Bertozzi graduated from Harvard University in 1988 and during her college days played keyboards in a band with Tom Morello called Bored of Education. Morello later cofounded Rage Against the Machine.

谈到这段经历时，卡罗琳打趣说：“那可是我人生的巅峰，在加入乐队后，我们经常在哈佛或者去各地一起演出。他后来成了一名摇滚明星，我不像他那么才华横溢，所以就去学化学了。”

"That might be the one thing that I’m best known for," she said. "He recruited me into his band and we played college parties at Harvard and around the Boston area, and then he went off to become a superstar. And I wasn’t talented the way he was. So I think I made the right choice to go to grad school."

“体育全能”型选手

图源：Chemistry World

与此同时，卡罗琳还有着极高的体育天赋。她是一名篮球迷，会踢足球，获得了很多学校的体育奖学金。卡罗琳说，虽然自己住在美国西海岸，但却是东海岸波士顿红袜队和凯尔特人队的狂热粉丝，她还骄傲地拿出了一张和NBA传奇球星拉里·伯德（Larry Bird）在上世纪八十年代的合影。

Bertozzi may live on the West Coast, but her heart remains with her hometown teams. She describes herself as a "rabid" Red Sox and Celtics fan and fondly recalls the time she had her photo taken with Larry Bird when he made an appearance at the Harvard Coop in the 1980s.