I love this word; I really do. For me, it conjures up images of a bionic man with a metal detector, searching for lost coins on some futuristic beach. Which is a ridiculous way to think, of course; I mean, what are the chances that coins will be usable currency by that stage of our evolution?

So you may well scoff at this figment of my childish imagination (and apparent illiteracy), but the true meaning of ‘bioprospector’ is not much less far-fetched. To give you some idea, a Wired article once referred to bioprospectors as ‘the Indiana Joneses of the 21st century’. How’s that for a word-picture? Makes my ‘bionic weirdo’ interpretation seem a bit weak, frankly. Who would have thought?

So who are these swashbucklers, exactly: these fearless adventurers full of rugged charm and devil-may-care attitude? Well, I don’t want you swooning to the point of distraction before I finish my piece, so I’ll warn you now to brace yourself for this description … bioprospectors are commercially minded scientists who target the biosphere in a ‘methodical search for novel pharmaceutical and other products from plants and micro-organisms’ (as Wiktionary so seductively puts it).

Pretty sexy stuff, huh? Take that, you Indiana Jones fans. How often do you hear him referred to as ‘methodical’? And when was the last time he sought out a micro-organism? (No, wait, there was Calista Flockhart.)

My point is: entrepreneurialism comes in many guises. Just as ‘cutting-edge cool’ is now the province of the geekocracy, it appears that even the ‘maverick explorer’ stereotype is undergoing a 21st-century reinvention. So pack your bags, Indi; looks like we have finally seen your last crusade.

Ryan Wallman is Senior Writer at WellmarkPerspexa by day and entrepreneur-cum-rugged-explorer by night (or something like that).

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