"I think my first scientific memories go back to the moon-landing: I was about 3 years old and I remember how my father woke me in the middle of the night to witness this event live."

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Bernd Eggen

Born in Bremerhaven, Germany, 1966
Intermediate Diploma in Chemistry and Mathematics

University of Freiburg, 1989

Ph.D. Theoretical Chemistry

University of Sussex, England, 1992

Areas of interest outside work

Fatherhood, the sea, cinema and walks.

It's about a billion seconds ago that I arrived on this planet - I was born in Bremerhaven, on the northern coast of Germany in 1966. (Other interesting events of 1966: Beatles recorded Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, England beat Germany in football, Michael de Bakey performed the first heart transplant operation in Houston.) I spent quite a bit of my childhood in this big, industrial harbour town and my parental home was in southwest Germany in Villingen in the Black Forest. Many non-natives think this is part of Bavaria, but it's actually in the state of Baden-Württemberg.

After attending local schools in Villingen, I studied Chemistry and Mathematics at the University of Freiburg from 1985 to 1989. After my intermediate Diploma I went to the University of Sussex in England and when my year as a visiting student was over, I had come to like the place so much that I decided to stay on and finish my degree there. This I did in 1992 with a PhD thesis in theoretical Chemistry - the title is so long that even I have to look it up now: "Potential energy functions for elemental solids and their application to group 14 elements". In theoretical Chemistry I could combine my chemical knowledge with mathematical and programming skills, which I very much enjoyed. If you want to know more, I am happy to explain.

After working for five years in academia as a postdoc, I decided on a change in career, which took me to Schlumberger, where I work as a Project Engineer, on the development of seismic processing software and recently on the redesign of a seismic ray-tracing package. This work has been varied and I've learned about a whole new field, Geophysics. Then in 2001, I joined the SEED team full-time as Translations Manager and Science Expert, which is a very exciting and rewarding position.

I think my first scientific memories go back to the moon-landing: I was about 3 years old and I remember how my father woke me in the middle of the night to witness this event live. Nature, in all its forms, fascinated me even before then and I collected everything from caterpillars to rocks to find out more about them. When I was about ten, I started to do chemical experiments, much to the dismay of my parents, who had to put up with sometimes unpleasant smells in the house. At school, I had some great Chemistry teachers, who encouraged my interest and allowed me to experiment with much better equipment in the school labs. One of my heroes was (and still is) Alexander von Humboldt, a German researcher, who in the early 19th century traveled South-America extensively and in his observations was well ahead of his time - he is thought of as one of the last people who was universally knowledgeable - an erudite (one who has a thorough comprehension of all the knowledge of his time). In August 1999, 30 years after I watched the first moonlanding live, I "dragged" my family and friends half across Europe to see a total solar eclipse, a spectacle of nature that made a deep impression on everyone of us.

There were two Chemistry "highlights" during my time at school - together with some friends I gave some experimental shows for fellow pupils and their parents during a project week and a few years later I entered the International Chemistry Olympics as part of the German team and won the third prize. As a result, I was awarded a scholarship from the "Studienstiftung" (National German Scholarship Foundation), which not only offered financial support during my studies, but also enabled me to broaden my horizon significantly through summer-schools and other events. I've touched on the highlights of my days in academia in the SEED article "The Discovery of Fullerenes".

I now live with my wife in Brighton, which is a very lively town on the south coast of England. I enjoy the sea, the local arts-cinema and walks. In 1999 I've become a father, (and again in 2001), which is now one of my main activities and I hope that the love for nature and our planet as a whole is something I can give my children, too.