Knowledge does not exist in a vacuum. Neither is it produced from out of thin air. Those who are blessed with an acute sense of curiosity and wonder go where few people go in search of the elusive Leopard.
Knowledge creation is an adventure. It is not for the timid. Only those who dare to negotiate unchartered territory come up with path-breaking knowledge. They are pioneers who build the foundations for future accretion of knowledge.
However, the creation of knowledge has increasingly turned into a collaborative exercise. Gone are the days when a lone scientist came up with a major discovery by working alone in a laboratory. Cutting edge knowledge exists at the intersections of disciplines. Breath of knowledge matters as much as its depth.
The alchemy for creating true knowledge is an optimal synthesizing of observation, experimentation, and theorizing.