Mello and Fire (now at Stanford University School of Medicine) wanted to find a better way to block gene expression during embryonic development. So they inserted RNA into their model organism, the microscopic roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans—a blocking maneuver that worked all too well. Interference spread from cell to cell, from generation to generation. Undeterred by these puzzling results, the two scientists persisted in their efforts to understand what they were seeing. They determined that the active agent was double-stranded RNA—a piece of the messenger and its pairing partner. It was a fundamental, transforming insight.

The path to discovery followed by Mello and Fire offers a framework for thinking about science and for the evolving research community that is taking shape at Janelia Farm. We intend Janelia Farm to be a place that fosters risk taking and collaboration. To help shape its scientific culture, we studied salient historical models, among them Bell Labs in Murray Hill, New Jersey, and England's Laboratory of Molecular Biology. The initial areas of research have been identified: understanding how the brain processes information and inventing imaging technologies and computational methods for image analysis. Scientists have been recruited. The first laboratories are up and functioning. An ambitious program of meetings and workshops has been scheduled. Graduate students will soon be identified through our joint program with the University of Cambridge and the University of Chicago. In short, this experiment is starting to take on a life of its own.

As Janelia Farm opens for discovery, it is impossible to predict what will unfold in the coming years. Will this vision—that physicists, computer scientists, engineers, and chemists can work shoulder-to-shoulder with biologists to explore the frontiers of biology—be as robust as we claim? We have talked about risk, but will the risk pay off in terms of discoveries? These are heady questions given the success of HHMI's existing approach to supporting biomedical research. Our investigators—as Craig Mello illustrates—are leaders in discovery. Janelia is a different model, with different expectations, but it too will rely on creative, daring individuals given the freedom and support to explore the big scientific problems of our time. As the Janelia scientists set down roots and begin their work throughout this fall season, we await, with great anticipation, the fresh new ideas, new approaches, and new findings that no doubt will arise this spring and in the years to come.

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