Quotes by Francis Collins

About Francis Collins:

Francis Sellers Collins is an American physician-geneticist noted for his discoveries of disease genes and his leadership of the Human Genome Project. He is director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

I'm a pretty informal guy. I ride a Harley.

Francis Collins

I think there are people who's lives have been saved because of the study of the genome.

Francis Collins

The brain is the most complicated organ in the universe. We have learned a lot about other human organs. We know how the heart pumps and how the kidney does what it does. To a certain degree, we have read the letters of the human genome. But the brai...

Francis Collins

A virus is not just DNA; a virus is also packaged up, covered over with a series of proteins in a nice, elegant, well-compacted form.

Francis Collins

We give our kids vaccinations. That's a biological enhancement that's considered not just acceptable but actually admirable.

Francis Collins

I took care of young adults with cystic fibrosis when I was in my residency training and found this to be a disease that was desperately in need of some explanation.

Francis Collins

If you are in support of in vitro fertilization, then you have to recognize that human embryos are being created in excess of what can be used safely to reimplant for a pregnancy. So they're going to end up being discarded.

Francis Collins

My own area of expertise is the genetics of human disease. I was fortunate to be part of the team that found the genes for cystic fibrosis, and Huntington's disease and neurofibromatosis.

Francis Collins

If you are looking for a needle in a haystack, and somebody has already cataloged all the straw in the haystack, when you get to that needle you will recognize it's different than what was supposed to be there based on all that computerized haystack ...

Francis Collins

The word 'living' has so many connotations that I'm almost reluctant to try to define it scientifically because it sounds as if I'm then downgrading all the other significances of that word.

Francis Collins

Many people struggle with losing weight and then regaining it. But there is no convincing evidence that the effort to lose weight actually promotes more weight gain in the long run.

Francis Collins

Patenting tends to get people's juices flowing when you put the word 'gene' and the word 'patent' in the same sentence. And understandably so. This is stuff we're carrying around - all of us - inside all of our cells. Should somebody be able to lay c...

Francis Collins

To get our universe, with all of its potential for complexities or any kind of potential for any kind of life-form, everything has to be precisely defined on this knife edge of improbability…. [Y]ou have to see the hands of a creator who set the pa...

Francis Collins

Science's domain is the natural. If you want to understand the natural world and be sure you're not misleading yourself, science is the way to do it.

Francis Collins

Growing up, I was vaguely aware of things that went on in church, because I was in the boys' choir at the local Episcopal church. But I got the clear message that I was supposed to learn music there, and not pay too much attention to the rest of it, ...

Francis Collins

I trained initially as a physical chemist, and then, after becoming interested in biology, I went to medical school and learned how to be a physician. So, I'm a physician scientist.

Francis Collins

Author Bio

  • NameFrancis Collins
  • DescriptionGeneticist; Director of the National Institutes of Health
  • BornApril 14, 1950
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionGeneticist
  • AwardsPresidential Medal Of Freedom; Princess Of Asturias Award - Technical And Scientific Research; Arthur S. Flemming Award