Learning physics of living systems from Dictyostelium

Unlike a new generation of scientists that are being trained directly to work on the physics of living systems, most of us more senior members of the community had to find our way from other research areas. We all have our own stories as to how we made this transition. Here, I describe how a chance encounter with the eukaryotic microorganism Dictyostelium discoideum led to a decades-long research project and taught me valuable lessons about how physics and biology can be mutually supportive disciplines.