Lately, some of the biggest news in the Armenian world has been about the Nobel Prize winner in Medicine Ardem Patapoutian (alongside David Julius), the first person of Armenian descent to be so honored. An alumnus of the AGBU Demirdjian School in Beirut, many articles noted his immigrant story of growing up during the Lebanese Civil War, moving to America and doing odd-jobs such as delivering pizza and writing horoscopes for an Armenian paper to put himself through university.
The social media world soon discovered he’s a prize-worthy tweeter as well, as the days that followed were full of entertaining thoughts and reactions. In particular, the way he shared how, on the very day he attained the pinnacle of achievement in his field… this happened:
His license plate PIEZOS references two ion channels which control the sense of touch, the work for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize. Even though touch is one of the senses which help us navigate the world, very little is actually known about the signaling mechanism behind it. And Despite winning the prize, Dr. Patapoutian has at least one dream left to come true:
Keeping with the theme of Armenian scientific innovators, just a few days later the NPR podcast “How I Built This” profiled Moderna co-founder Noubar Afeyan. If you’ve ever wondered what put him on the path to having one of the most recognizable brand names in the world, this is for you:
Yet another scientific Armenian being talked about on social media is Rema Matevosyan, who turned her childhood interest in astronomy into a geospatial mapping startup which does the job much cheaper and with a lower carbon footprint than planes or satellites:
As we’ve now seen, Armenians are innovators in just about every field. Behold, the story of melonpan: the famous Japanese dessert and its Armenian creator:
Other Armenian international news in the spotlight is the centuries if not millennia-old relations with India, as highlighted by India’s Foreign Minister during the recent first-of-its-kind trip to Yerevan. Dr. Jaishankar shared with his over one million followers many Armenian treasures he encountered during his journey, including these paintings by Sarkis Katchadourian inspired by the art of India’s Ajanta Caves complex.
Finally, if you haven’t seen it yet, check out this video from New England Patriots Football Head Coach Bill Belichick calling for human rights to prevail in Artsakh and to encourage Americans to contact their representatives to enact Congressional measures to that effect, such as humanitarian aid and to release Armenian POWs:
