"He's very straightforward," says Higgins. "He has high expectations, but if you know what you're getting into, you're fine. It's what you would want for yourself, anyway. He will ask you to do something and expect it to be done well."

He is "insistent" about his exercise time. Every day, he slots three hours to go to the fieldhouse to work out, whenever he's finished his morning tasks.

When Mansour started in Capecchi's lab, he was extremely involved in the work, and the multidisciplinary team itself was smaller than it is now. Capecchi, she says, listens more than he talks. But "if you listen hard, it's always quite worthwhile."

"He was very important to me when I started here," says Mary Beckerle, now deputy director of the Huntsman Cancer Institute. Besides enjoying working with someone of his growing renown and knowledge, "he really embraced me. I think he is this incredibly wonderful person. He's quiet but has a generous spirit that's really nice."

Capecchi is known for his "steady, consistent appreciation for excellence and quality. That's so important for how this place has developed. He is a role model for how to do science," Beckerle says.

Some scientists get discouraged by the big questions, she adds. "Technology has made it easy to do things, to generate data without getting to the next level of understanding, so you can get caught up in lots of small results."

Capecchi admits he shuns little questions, which yield little results. He's a big-picture guy.

In faculty meetings, he's "quiet, but often contributes the incisive, conclusive comment," Beckerle says. "Some people misunderstand him," perhaps thinking he is stand-offish when he is, in fact, shy. "He is brilliant, very insightful, and he integrates things in very creative ways."

In a ceremony at the U. inviting Capecchi to Israel for the Wolf Prize, an Israeli official called him a "genius." Dr. A. Lorris Betz, U. senior vice president of health sciences and dean of the medical school, called him a "roving ambassador" for the U. because of his international acclaim.

Capecchi himself is more prosaic.

"Science is a funny thing. As soon as you've done it, you forget it. Yesterday's results are already achieved, and you preoccupy yourself with the things you want to do.

"Besides. Past accomplishments have no bearing on whether you get the grant" to continue research.

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E-mail: lois@desnews.com