Not every doctoral student has a chance to spend quality time with Nobel laureates, but PhD candidate Nicholas Chancellor did just that over the summer.

For one week in July, Chancellor met with 27 recipients of the Nobel Prize at The Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings in Germany.

“I was most impressed by the small discussion groups,” said Chancellor, one of nearly 600 students who were invited to attend the 62nd annual meeting of the award winners. “All researchers who attended had ample opportunity to meet with the laureates and were exposed to their amazing insights into the world.”

Begun in 1951, the annual Lindau Nobel laureate meetings bring generations of scientists together to discuss current topics and to propose new areas of research for the future.

For young scientists like Chancellor, the opportunity to engage in discussions about cutting-edge research is a singular experience. Topics vary from year to year. Fortunately for Chancellor, this year’s event was dedicated to physics.

After the meetings concluded, Chancellor reflected on the opportunities that the gatherings afforded for sharing projects, trading ideas and building a worldwide network of scholars.

“Diversity is a great resource within science,” he said. “Being exposed to the European scientific culture [allows] me some new perspective on scientific thinking and how I should approach problem-solving in my own research.”

USC hopes to send another student to next year’s meetings, which will focus on chemistry.