Science is really about describing the way the universe works in one aspect or another in all branches of science-how a life-form works, how this works, how that works. ... You have to have a natural curiosity for that.

The atoms become like a moth, seeking out the region of higher laser intensity.

Occasionally, I would focus on a particular school project and become obsessed with, what seemed to my mother, to be trivial details instead of apportioning the time I spent on school work in a more efficient way.

Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.

I think the Caribbean countries face rising oceans and they face increase in the severity of hurricanes. This is something that is very, very scary to all of us. The island states in the world represent - I remember this number - one-half of 1 percent of the carbon emissions in the world. And they will - some of them will disappear.

Geometry was the first exciting course I remember.

I believe [the Department of Energy] should be judged not by the money we direct to a particular State or district, company, university or national lab, but by the character of our decisions. The Department of Energy serves the country as a Department of Science, a Department of Innovation, and a Department of Nuclear Security.

I'm the least-educated person in my immediate family. My two other brothers have multiple advanced degrees, and I only have one. [...] Actually, now that I've got a Nobel Prize, I feel equal.

If other countries don't impose a cost on carbon, then we will be at a disadvantage...we would look at considering perhaps duties that would offset that cost.

I approached the bulk of my schoolwork as a chore rather than an intellectual adventure.

I also developed an interest in sports, and played in informal games at a nearby school yard where the neighborhood children met to play touch football, baseball, basketball and occasionally, ice hockey.

Coal is my worst nightmare.

My physics teacher, Thomas Miner was particularly gifted. To this day, I remember how he introduced the subject of physics. He told us we were going to learn how to deal with very simple questions such as how a body falls due to the acceleration of gravity.

Of course we don't want the price of gasoline to go up, we want it to go down.

Since I walked in the door as secretary of energy, I've been doing everything in our powers to do what we can to reduce these gas prices. ... So, of course we don't want the price of gasoline to go up we want it to go down.

At Rochester, I came with the same emotions as many of the entering freshman: everything was new, exciting and a bit overwhelming, but at least nobody had heard of my brothers and cousins.

Education in my family was not merely emphasized, it was our raison d'etre.

Pick the right sized pot, don't pick a pot five times bigger, twice as big.