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Professor Ben Ceerzee-Gooser was working late, as usual, poring over the data of his latest set of graphene experiments. He was alone in the lab, having (generously, he thought) given his latest post-doc, Barb Cottich, the afternoon off to attend the end of year faculty bash. He was slightly in shock since his long-term research partner, Professor Marco Jabley, had suddenly handed in his resignation that afternoon, leaving his university chair with immediate effect. They had recently completed an award-winning project which looked to bring the commercial production of graphene – using copper disks in pressurised ovens – much closer. Marco’s resignation was not entirely out of the blue. They’d recently Skyped – Marco worked at the University of  Bologna – and he knew that he’d been unhappy for some time. He professed to be falling out of love with higher education, seeing it as overly driven by one-upmanship through achieving ‘impact’ – whatever that was – and income – more tangible – rather than scientific progress. He was probably on to something, Ben, mused, but working in graphene meant you could tick both of those boxes and still do fun work, albeit at a frenetic pace to stay ahead of the competition. He knew that a team at CSIRO in Sydney were hot on their heels, and there was no time He was about to return to his studies when there was a knock at the door. It was Barb, asking if he wanted to join them at the end of term Christmas party. ‘No, no thanks, things to do’, he replied. She nodded, and left. That kind of thing was not his bag. He resented his colleagues’ jealousy at his success, and the way they were always asking about his work. He was convinced they just wanted to ride on this coat tails, and that would never do. They’d no doubt hold him back, and his success was down to his own graft – it was unfair to be piggy-backed by others. They should stand on their own two feet.   He glimpsed across his desk at one of few photographs on it. It showed a group of mostly young scientists, squinting at the camera in bright