In my opinion, biology is going to be the most exciting scientific field for the next 100 years. There is now a new interface emerging between material sciences and the biological sciences. We are now engineering material substances at the level of individual atoms, the same scale on which the human body is engineered. Students who wish to enter this field should first acquire a deep understanding of the natural sciences, including physics, chemistry, mathematics and computer sciences. Training in these fields must be done early, as it is difficult to pick them up later.
Biology is a much more accessible subject and can be learned later.
My recommendation is for students to be trained in the hard sciences through first-year graduate studies at least, before embarking on a career in the biological and medical sciences. Human Genome Sciences has been the first to reduce the notion of genomic medicine from concept to clinic. At present, we have three drugs based on our genomic discoveries in clinical trials. The first drug, MPIF-1, is a natural human substance that negatively regulates the blood supply. We have recently concluded a preliminary safety trial with satisfactory results, and are now planning additional safety and preliminary efficacy test in cancer patients.