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Floyd Bloom: Neuroscience was not even a word

ABSTRACT

Floyd Bloom says that he grew up, surrounded by doctors and pills, in a drug store in Dallas, where his father and uncles were pharmacists. He is a natural storyteller, readily recalling the people and events that have shaped his career. His narrative skills were apparent as early as high school, where he was encouraged, partially on the basis of aptitude tests, to pursue a career in journalism or public relations, and to stay away from hard subjects like math and science. In college, he majored in German literature, although he pursued premedical studies in accordance with his father's wishes. During his medical school and residency experiences in St. Louis, he recounts, he always attempted to carry in his mind an organized way of explaining his academic and clinical activities to the professors and attending physicians that might quiz him. His subsequent research into the central nervous system similarly benefited from his ability not only to anticipate and formulate questions, the answers to which often required the development of new methods, technologies, and alliances, but also to place his findings in novel contexts where they could be conceptually appreciated and utilized. The prospect of telling good scientific stories was one of the factors that later drew Bloom to the position of Editor-in-Chief of Science magazine (1995-2000). While there, he was instrumental in widening the contexts in which the magazine presents science, and in shaping the ways that scientific information is electronically disseminated across the globe. Currently on sabbatical from Scripps, Floyd Bloom continues to explore, as CEO of a startup company in La Jolla, the entrepreneurial contexts in which his own research can be applied.