•Shekhar Gupta: In Sweden, I thought Sweden was a bit boring for a young graduate.

John Adler: Oh Sweden is quite an adventurous place to be for a year. And so I went to Sweden, and I assumed that I would find some academic work but really for me it was important to get out of Harvard, to get out of Boston and spend the year abroad and the best thing I went there was with no specific idea in mind.

•Shekhar Gupta: And you ended up with this Gamma knife team.

John Adler: Right, right..so I was working with Lakswell and I realised that he was doing things that were magical in my eyes. Harvard men like to think they know everything but I quickly realised once I was working with Laksell that there was this whole future of radio surgery out there.

•Shekhar Gupta: So, when did you first realise that Gamma knife was a foundation I could build on.

John Adler: Within weeks of working with Laksell I said this is special but all I could do was treat a few limited brain tumors. I said if only if only we could take this kind of concept and make it work for the rest of the body. So, I spent the next couple of years trying to figure out a way to do it.

•Shekhar Gupta: I noticed it works well with hard tumors. Brain, lung, pancreas, liver.

... contd.