Biological engineering is not necessarily understanding systems but rather I want to be able to design and build biological systems to perform particular applications.

My training as an engineer has enabled me to design the stuff but the reason I do it is not to make music but for the opportunity to work with musicians.

So I went for engineering specifically product design which I enjoyed.

We worked with the engineers in the design and construction and testing phases in those various areas then we would get back together at the end of the week and brief each other as to what had gone on.

I'm not into politics but I am committed to a cause: ensuring design technology and engineering stays on the U.K. curriculum alongside science and maths - grounding abstract theory merging the practical with the academic.

Britain's great strength is its innovative design and engineering natural ability and we're not using it.

A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.

My dad was an engineer and so I had this picture of science and technology and pursuits of the mind as being more impressive than artistic pursuits which I saw a as kind of frivolous.

I would say the most help I got was from my dad. My dad is a civil engineer in Switzerland he's 90 years old now so he's no longer active as a civil engineer but still a very active person.

I was really bright as a kid and tested well and it was clear that I was going to get scholarships to any schools I wanted. My dad always said I could be an engineer at that time it was the elite of society: steady job working in science which was then the answer to every problem we had. It was kind of a mandate. Kind of a dream he had for me.