How CEMB began—and what must come next.

The idea for a first-rate laboratory of teaching and research in modern biology at the University of the Punjab, Lahore, emerged from discussions between Dr Ahmed Iqbal Bukhari (then at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories, New York) and Dr S. Riazuddin (then at the Nuclear Institute for Agriculture and Biology, Faisalabad), held in 1979 in Rawalpindi. The concept of a multidisciplinary institution within a university setting was endorsed at a meeting of the heads of Pakistan’s federal science and technology organisations, chaired by the President of Pakistan, which resolved to locate the new institution at the University of the Punjab.

Dr Riazuddin’s services were transferred to the University of the Punjab as the first Director of the Centre for Advanced Studies in Molecular Biology, which was upgraded in 1986 by the Federal Ministry of Education to the “Centre of Excellence in Molecular Biology” under the 1974 Act of Parliament establishing Centres of Excellence in universities. The Centre began in two student laboratories on the ground floor of the Zoology Department. Formal declaration of CEMB’s establishment followed at a meeting hosted by the then Governor and Chancellor of the University of the Punjab, with special grants from PSF and the UGC (now HEC).

CEMB grew into Pakistan’s first postgraduate molecular biology teaching and research institution, offering short courses on the EMBO/Cold Spring Harbor pattern alongside M.Phil and Ph.D programmes for students from agricultural, biological, medical and physical science backgrounds. The programme was shaped with the help of a seven-member Foreign Advisory Council that included three Nobel Laureates and two members of the US National Academy of Sciences, with roughly a quarter of all research dedicated to high-quality basic science underpinning CEMB’s applied work.

A significant share of CEMB’s funding came from international organisations — the US National Science Foundation, US National Institutes of Health, the EU Science Consortium, the Rockefeller Foundation, ICGEB, IFS and TWAS among them — while collaborations with Johns Hopkins University, the University of Washington, Ghent University and University College London trained Ph.D scholars and transferred technology. CEMB was the first laboratory to clone interferon and related human genes, and the first in Pakistan to begin stem-cell research for regenerative medicine.

Be observational, be patient, be consistent — there is no substitute for hard work, which is always rewarded. Never be disheartened by apparent failure; every failure is a step forward on the ladder to success. Choose a research problem scientifically: ask cogent questions, develop a hypothesis, and analyse your data critically, since much can be learned from what first appears trivial.

Isaac Newton pondered why an apple fell to the ground; Archimedes noticed, stepping into his bath, that the water displaced equalled the volume of his body; August Kekulé dreamed of a snake biting its own tail and found the structure of benzene; and C. V. Raman’s discovery of the Raman spectrum began with a child-like observation that ocean water looks blue. Molecular biology today stands where chemistry and physics stood a century ago — its excitements are still to come.

The incoming Ph.D research fellows are fortunate to join a Centre rich in resources, experience and infrastructure. Enjoy molecular biology, and practise it well — for it tells you how a tiny living being does what it does.