If you want to watch live coverage of the Orion liftoff, check out the following links:
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html#.VIBDJ9LF8rV
http://www.ustream.tv/nasahdtv
The liftoff has already been delayed several times due to wind, core engine temperature readings and a fuel and drain valve that did not close. Let's hope there is a launch today within the time window remaining.
For those of you who don't follow NASA's activities, Orion is an unmanned flight that will launch atop a Delta IV heavy rocket. It will be a two-orbit, four-hour flight followed by landing in the Pacific Ocean. The launch will be at Cape Canaveral in Florida, and will be a flight test of the systems that are most critical to safety. The ultimate and future goal is to take astronauts further into space than they've ever gone before.
Showing posts with label Science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Science. Show all posts
Thursday, December 4, 2014
Friday, July 4, 2014
What I did before my summer vacation (one hectic month in the life of an academic researcher)
Academia is an
unpredictable profession at best; for the most part, one never knows from year
to year how much funding one will have to design and implement research
projects, how many students one will have responsibility for, how many grant
proposals one will write, or even how many papers one will write and send for
publication. The unpredictability of the profession stems from the
unpredictability associated with grant funding: is a researcher’s proposal good
enough; will it get into the top ten percent; will it get funded, and if so,
how much will the researcher get; will he or she get support for students and
lab consumables or just consumables; and what happens if he or she doesn’t get
funding. The list of worries is potentially a long one.
December and June are
always busy and hectic months in academia, mostly because researchers rush to
finish experiments and to send out their articles before the Christmas holidays
and summer vacation, respectively. They are stressful months that have to be
confronted and tackled before one can take vacation in good conscience. The odd
thing is that the pace of academia is so erratic; during the other months,
there are often lulls when one wishes one was busier. Personally, I would
prefer if the pace was more even and thus less stressful during the entire
academic year, such that the amount of work was spread out more evenly.
So what did I do from mid-May until now, before my summer vacation? I am co-adviser for a PhD student who has to
deliver her thesis by the end of July, plus send her last article for
publication so that she can write in her thesis that it has been submitted for
publication. I am senior author on that paper, so I have read through and
edited the paper several times during the month of June. Additionally, I have read
through and edited her thesis for both scientific and grammatical accuracy
several times. Most Norwegian students write their theses in English. I believe
it is now a requirement, whereas their defense can be in Norwegian, although
many choose to defend in English. Most Norwegians speak English well,
especially the younger ones who have grown up watching American TV programs and
movies, surfing the internet/social media, and listening to music. So it is not
a major problem to edit a thesis for correct English usage; it just takes time.
But this is what a senior scientist does—it’s part of the job.
I also wrote a grant proposal that I submitted to the Cancer Society in
early June. I spent more than a month reading background articles and writing
the proposal, which had to do with treating gastrointestinal cancers with drugs
that drive them into a senescent (non-proliferating) state. I was a peer reviewer for an article about treating colorectal
cancer with a combination of natural compounds that led to effective tumor kill
without killing normal cells, a win-win situation for patients. I was also an external
grant reviewer for another country; this is often done—that granting agencies
send out grant proposals for external review outside their own country. In this
case, I learned a lot about treatment of colorectal cancer with adoptive cell transfer
using tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. This is a field I knew only a bit about,
but about which I know quite a lot more at this point after having read the
proposal and a number of review articles that helped me to understand it so
that I could review it properly. I also read and edited an article written by
two of my colleagues who asked me to check their review article for correct English
usage and grammar. I also read some background articles about ionizing radiation
and how it is used in cancer treatment; this was information I found on the
American Cancer Society website. I am impressed with the information that is
available there to patients and their families, and impressed with the writers
who create these articles and brochures. Finally, I printed out a number of
review articles about mass spectrometry imaging of tissue samples; this is a
cutting-edge technology that has a bright future not only in cancer research,
but in pathology generally, as well as in disease treatment, pharmacology and
toxicology. I need to learn as much about it as possible in case I travel to
visit a medical center in the States that uses this technology successfully in
their research projects.
It occurred
to me today that I could work as an editor of a scientific journal, as a senior
adviser for any number of scientific/political organizations, and as a scientific writer.
I do all these things in my job as an academic research scientist, in addition
to planning research projects and figuring out how to implement them. One must
also figure out how to do all these things on a limited budget if such is the
case. Academia is really a creative profession, in more ways than one.
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Using social networks
I read an article the other day that indicated that Facebook's popularity was waning, especially among younger people. That doesn’t
surprise me; what surprises me is that the level of interest in any social network
is sustainable for more than five years, given the short attention spans we
have developed for most things technological or IT-related. It’s the nature of
the beast; something better is always going to come along eventually and
supplant the king of the jungle. I suppose that’s the way it should be; at
least that’s been the name of the game for as long as I can remember.
I use the social networks Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn,
and I use them for different purposes. I think most people might say the same.
It’s a conscious decision on my part to keep them separate from each other.
Facebook is my way of keeping in touch with friends and family in the USA, and
to some extent, here in Europe. You’d be surprised at how difficult it’s become to
get people who live only a town or two away from Oslo, together in one room for
a social event. Planning an evening out with three or more people has become a
major affair; it’s often easier to update each other on what’s going on via
Facebook. So instead of writing five emails a week to friends, I update my
status on Facebook several times per week, but not on a daily basis. So Facebook is for personal use. I use Twitter
for professional purposes; I follow most science-related sites; the list grows
ever longer. I am now following sites that have to do with politics and
government, and find them interesting as well. Not surprising perhaps, when you
understand the importance of politics in the creation of policies for how
science should be made understandable and relevant for the public (e.g. climate
change, global warming, science education in schools, sustainable energy
sources). When I started off using Twitter, I wasn’t sure what it might be good
for, and I didn’t understand why people sang its praises. Now I know. It’s an
amazing way of getting news as it happens. Science publishers like Nature and Science have discovered this; they need only post a short tweet as
to what the new hot article is on their websites and in their journals and they’re
guaranteed that interested readers will read their tweets and click on the
relevant links. New scientific discoveries and interesting new articles spread
like wildfire. So I use Twitter to stay updated on what is going on in my
field, as well as in science generally. I even credit Twitter with getting me
interested in astronomy. You need only follow NASA on Twitter (https://twitter.com/NASA) to understand
why. If I had been better in math, I might have been an astronomer, the field
is that interesting. Daily Science is another site I follow; you can find them
here: https://twitter.com/DailyScienceUp.
Guardian Science is another favorite; you can find them here: https://twitter.com/guardianscience.
And if you’re interested in following me on Twitter, here is the link: https://twitter.com/paulamdeangelis.
Finally, LinkedIn; it doesn’t surprise me at all that
potential employers/recruiters utilize this site frequently. I read an article
the other day (courtesy of Twitter) that reported that LinkedIn was the social
network that most recruiters use (http://www.livescience.com/29178-recruiters-find-job.html?cmpid=514645).
What other platform provides CVs, references, and personal/professional
interests for potential candidates for employment? Better yet, what other
platform provides you with a candidate’s connections, that may be even more
interesting (employable) than the actual candidate in question? This network, like
Twitter, is reserved for my professional use, and I plan on keeping it that
way. I am careful as to whom I include as a connection, as I want to build a
network that can be valuable to me professionally. A nice touch is that your
connections can write recommendations for you that are published on the site.
Potential employers read such things. Your connections can also recommend
specific skills, but I find this aspect less useful than an actual written
recommendation.
How things have changed during the past ten years. In that
sense, who knows what the next ten years will bring? One thing is certain;
there is a new social network or platform just waiting in the wings, whether
you like it or not, or whether the current social networks like it or not. That’s
the nature of the beast.
Friday, September 21, 2012
Thinking about the future, reflecting on the past
Thinking
about the future, reflecting on the past, and trying to live in the moment--the
unending challenge. I try to make sense of past events, to learn from them, and
to use whatever little wisdom I gain to plan for the future. I suppose everyone
does this. It’s probably part of getting older, because of course the older we
get, the more ‘past’ there is behind us for us to reflect upon. I register that
I have changed a lot, just within the past several years. Unsettling workplace
events and family experiences impact on how one wants to live in the present
and plan for the future. I have finally learned to let go of how I wanted things to be and to accept
how they actually are. My work life was one of those things I thought I had a
firm grasp on, but it changed shape as I held it and became difficult to hold
in one place—like a squirming child. The work world has changed dramatically
and for a while the difficulty was just to hang on to the speeding car as it
careened forward. Now the car has either slowed or I have mastered running
faster to keep up. I definitely know that I absorb information and adjust to
change much faster now than I ever did before. And since that seems to be the
goal of modern workplaces—to get employees to adjust to constant change--I
guess the change is a positive one. But it is not my full-time job that has
produced that change, despite the constant pressure to change; it is my
consultant work for the UiO science library and for Liivmedia that have had the
greatest effect upon me. If I have ‘broadened my horizons’ and changed my
approach, it is because I reached out in a whole new direction when I decided
to work for both of them, and found a whole new arena in which to enjoy
science. Following the different scientific social media and internet sites,
reading, digesting, absorbing and commenting on articles I read in all areas of
science has been immensely freeing and exhilarating. I don’t want to just read
about what goes on in the field of cancer research anymore; I find reading
about astrophysics, the universe, global warming, nutrition, and bee colony
collapse disorder just as interesting. I have concluded after much reflection
on past decisions that I have no regrets that I pursued a career in science.
But I have understood that I don’t have to be just a research scientist to
enjoy science or even to work in science. There are many different careers that
one can have that utilize a science background—science communication, science journalism,
journal editor, patent law, social media, consultant. Even though I will likely
end my work life as a research scientist, it heartens me to know that I have
contributed successfully as a consultant as well. That’s what I would tell
young people these days; don’t limit your options. Keep all doors open. It
makes for a more dynamic career and an adventurous future.
Monday, July 30, 2012
A good book--Bad Science by Ben Goldacre
If I could
recommend one good book this summer, Bad
Science by Ben Goldacre would be it. I know the book has been around for
several years, but I am just finally getting around to reading it. I am
thoroughly enjoying it, not only as a scientist interested in how the public
understands science, but also as a member of that public. As I read the book, I
try to put myself in the shoes of non-scientists, to determine if they can really
understand what Ben Goldacre is saying. I believe they can—he is that good a
writer—never dull or dry, rather smart and humorous, but deadly serious concerning
what he writes about. I find myself thinking—yes, it’s good to be skeptical and
questioning, it’s correct to want to see good statistics in newspaper articles,
something to which he devotes an entire chapter (Bad Stats). It’s correct to
want the media to be accountable for their reporting of medical and scientific
issues. I know that it’s ok to be all these things, because as a scientist, I
both write and review articles (peer review) for scientific journals. Part of
learning to become a scientist involves learning to be critical, objective, unemotional,
and tough when reviewing articles for your peers as well as when writing your
own. You learn to welcome constructive criticism from co-authors and journal
editors alike. You learn to swallow your pride and put aside your ego often, to
edit your own article in ways that you never thought possible, and to suggest
that other scientists do the same when it is your turn to be a reviewer.
I think Bad Science should be required reading
for high school and college students, so important is its message. And it might
get fledgling scientists to really take
a look at what is demanded of them for the future in terms of the quality of
the research they will perform, and why it is important for them to adhere to a
few basic ground rules. Because Ben Goldacre has no patience for quacks or
sloppy science, and he is not afraid to say so. Here are just a few of the
chapter titles in Bad Science: The
Placebo Effect; The Nonsense du Jour; How the Media Promote the Public
Misunderstanding of Science; Why Clever People Believe Stupid Things; and The Media’s MMR Hoax. He is merciless
when it comes to holding the media accountable for what they write about
medicine and science, and he is right. They should be held accountable, from
journalists all the way up to editors. But as I said, he is also humorous, in
that especially British sort of way. His description of the media frenzy
surrounding Tony and Cherie Blair’s failure to comment as to whether they had
vaccinated their infant son Leo, and their foray into the world of homeopathy
and New Age, is priceless. Ditto his
description of how the scientific community dealt with the anti-vaccine campaign
of a few years ago; here is an example from his chapter about the MMR
(measles/mumps/rubella triple vaccine) hoax—“Emotive anecdotes from distressed
parents were pitted against old duffers in corduroy, with no media training,
talking about scientific data”. If nothing else, you get a good mental picture
of stodgy old scientists who were totally clueless as to how they should
counter the arguments against vaccinating children. Hence his campaign for the
public understanding of science; it involves prodding scientists to explain
their work clearly and concisely to the public as much as it does prodding the
public to make a real effort to learn to understand how science is done. Ben
Goldacre also writes a column for the British newspaper The Guardian, and
otherwise a website that he updates regularly:
http://www.badscience.net/, both of them well-worth checking
out.
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Third-graders and their questions about science
A few posts
ago, I talked about the third-graders at a Long Island grammar school who had
written letters to me asking me about my work and life as a scientist. I received
sixteen hand-printed letters in the mail right before Easter vacation, and read
through them all. Their teacher (my good friend) helped them formulate some of
the questions. Many of them were insightful, many were cute, a few were out
there, but all of them were indicative of a group of youngsters who are
thinking about their daily life and surroundings. That is a good thing and
should be encouraged at all costs, especially if we want the younger generation
to choose science and math when they get to high school and college.
Here are
some of their questions that I am busy answering these days:
1. What do I know about cancer and are
we coming close to a cure?
2. How is my research on cancer going?
3. What would I do to stop cancer?
4. Do I know the cure for cancer?
5. Do a lot of unhealthy foods give you
cancer?
6. Did any members of my family get
cancer?
7. Do I like to study cancer?
8. Do I study just cancer?
9. Does a cell get destroyed from
cancer?
10. How many kinds of cancer are there?
11. Will a sickness go away if you take
care of it by yourself?
12. What have I researched in the past
and what am I researching now?
13. Is it hard work to be a scientist?
14. Do I have any helpers in the lab?
15. How did I become a researcher?
16. What does a research biologist do?
17. Do I have my own cool lab?
18. Is it fun to be a scientist?
19. How come I am not writing a book
about science, and have I written science
books or regular books?
20. Is Norway a hot place to live?
21. How is it to live in Norway?
22. How are the fjords in Norway?
23. Have I ever studied the human heart?
24. Do all rabbits eat grass only?
25. Is it ok to eat the bananas that
have brown dots on them and that the fruit flies fly around?
26. Do I make potions?
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Third-graders and science
I recently agreed to answer questions from third-graders about what it means to be a scientist, what a scientist does, and so forth, as part of a project to get students interested in science. My friend teaches third-graders in a Long Island, NY, elementary school, and it is her class that I agreed to 'talk to'. I cannot do so in person, so we agreed that her students would write letters to me with their questions. Today when I got home from work, there was an envelope waiting for me. Inside were personal letters written to me by hand from about twenty students. I had a long day in the lab, so when I got home I was pretty exhausted. But after reading these letters, I perked up again. They are just so sweet and unusual and interesting. It will be fun to answer their questions and to see what I can come up with in the way of photos and other items that will allow them to 'see' what it is I do everyday. I thought I would post some of their questions here over the next month or so, anonymously of course. But it will give you an idea of what third-graders think about when they think about science. Stay tuned.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Another day in the life of a scientist
Long day in
the lab yesterday. One of those days that leave you dead-tired, so that when
you get home you just want to find the couch, turn the TV on and just do
nothing. Got my morning coffee first. Workday started off with me doing a procedure
called western blotting—104 cell samples loaded manually (by me) onto four
plastic-like gels and pushed through them by electricity. Point of procedure? To
separate proteins in the samples according to their molecular weights. Just the
sample loading took over an hour. Have to pay attention--very easy to make a
mistake and load the wrong sample in the wrong place. Made buffers after that.
Found all the accessories needed to complete the procedure. Lunchtime in my
office. Knock on my office door. Impromptu visit from the big boss. Shoveled in
my salad while talking about my future—lab frock on and thoroughly harried. Thought
about that. In my younger days I wouldn’t have eaten a bite while talking to
the boss. Would have been too nervous. Now I do. No longer nervous. Getting
used to all these conversations. Back in the lab. Two more hours of finishing up
this gel procedure. Nice results. A reward for the hard work and long hours.
Not always that way. A quick coffee break. Meeting with my student--discussed results.
Hers and mine—she does the same procedure to get data so we can discuss what’s
happening in her cells. Interesting project. She will get her thesis done. Hope
there will be an article out of it. Cannot predict that when you first start
the work. Do all this work for several months and suddenly a dead-end. That’s
research. Used to disappointments—makes success all the more enjoyable. Scanned
in some data, transferred it to the computer, sent it on to my student. Finished
up paperwork before heading for home. Bought a grilled chicken, fried up some
mushrooms, made broccoli—voila—dinner on my own. Hubby out with his lab group
for dinner. TV night for once—not often that happens! The King’s Speech, Game
of Thrones, The Way We Were—well-worth the watching time. Monday starts another
week, more long days in the lab. Wonder how I did this when I was younger—long long
hours in the lab, sometimes twelve per day. Dead-tired a lot of the time. Like
being in the lab though. Will probably be doing that till I retire--white frock
on, in front of the lab bench, alone. Not a bad way to work given the new
workplace propensity for long unsatisfying meetings these days. Would rather be
in the lab, all things considered.
Saturday, January 21, 2012
A day in the life of a scientist
Dead tired
this morning, but made it to work by the usual time. Started the day by walking
to the main cafeteria to buy a cup of (regular) coffee. Can’t live without my
coffee. Already had my espresso at home before we left for work. Latest
research shows—coffee is good for you—three or four cups a day—perfect. Opened
Outlook—checked my emails. One of them was a thank-you email from a granting agency
in Singapore thanking me for reviewing two of their grant applications. I do
that now—I get paid for it. Got started on answering my emails early, and got
them out of the way. Trying to figure out the best way to formulate emails
these days can take several hours for just a couple of them. Made a few phone
calls. Arranged an examiner for my Master’s student who will have her exam in
June—took all of about half an hour. Ecstatic! Wasn’t as easy three years ago
when I had to find opponents for my PhD student. Frustrating then. Went and
talked to one of the women in the pathology department who is the
administrative leader for the technicians there. Talked about the logistics of
a project that needs technical help from the department. One of my jobs now—to coordinate
external and internal research projects that require routine technical help. Went
online to get price information for two items that needed to be ordered. Went
to the secretary who enters the orders into the computer. Chatted for a while.
Have decided that nice is the way to be; everything goes more smoothly when you
treat others well. Don’t care if the rest of the world thinks it’s not
efficient. Can honestly say that I've been nice to others most of the time. Worked through lunch doing my consulting job. On Twitter checking
out all the updates. What would I do without it? Better than Facebook in so
many ways. So much info on social media, so little time.
Started working after lunch on analyzing some statistical data for my student’s project—realized I had made
so many mistakes the first time I filled in the data tables. Why? I was dead
tired and when you are dead tired you shouldn’t be working at the computer
filling in data tables. Couldn’t understand why the graphs looked so odd
afterwards—huge standard errors. Now I know. Solved that problem. Moving right
along. Did a literature search on microRNAs—they’re
what’s hot now besides stem cells. Feeling the pressure to conform again. Maybe
I’ll get more grant support that way. Can I do like the others? We’ll see at
grant time in May when I start writing them. Printed out four review articles on microRNAs. Went
back to working on the statistical data. Playing around with grouping the data in different ways to produce different plots. Saw some interesting differences between untreated
and treated samples—there might be a story after all. Ecstatic again! It’s not
often that happens. Most of the time—balloons get punctured. Started dreaming
about the experiments I want to do. Usually do this whenever lab work goes
well. When it goes badly, I want to go home, crawl into bed and pull the covers
over my head. Saved the statistical tables in one file, emailed a copy of it to my home email,
and decided that for once I will look at it during the weekend. But right now,
glad it’s Friday. Monday it starts all over again……..
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
From pimp my ride to pimp my research
I attended
another interesting event sponsored by the UiO Science library this morning, a
lecture about how to ‘pimp’ your research, followed by a really interesting
discussion about pimping of research in general—should it be pimped, how it
should be done, and who should be responsible for pimping. The scientist who
held the lecture and who guided the discussion afterwards was Gro Amdam, whom I’ve
mentioned before in a previous post. Professor Amdam is a Norwegian scientist
who runs two research labs, one at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences in
Aas Norway, the other at Arizona State University in the USA. She is a honeybee
researcher and a top scientist, with many publications in top international
journals; you can read more about her labs, work, publications and view her
journal covers here: http://amdamlab.asu.edu/. Some of the scientists I talked to
about this event when I was promoting it a few weeks ago were a bit skeptical;
perhaps mostly skeptical to the terminology—pimping. They weren’t sure what was
meant by pimping research, and instead of being curious enough to find out more
about it, they didn’t attend. They should have, because they missed a really
good and professional presentation about the subject and an interesting
discussion afterwards. Pimping is defined as ‘giving something a smarter or
more interesting appearance’; some excellent examples in my opinion are Amdam's journal
covers—beautiful photos of bees and flowers that add an important visual aspect
to the research work that was published inside the specific issue. She emphasized
that it was pimping the (high-quality) work that was important; this was not a talk about how
to pimp the scientist. But the scientist can become well-known because of the quality
of the work via good pimping—and that’s a good thing. It helps get research
grants, funding, and international recognition.
There was a
good deal of discussion about the cultural differences and approaches to
pimping between the USA and Norway. In the USA, research pimping is an accepted
and encouraged activity at universities; the idea is relatively new in Norway. Most
of the Norwegian attendees were very positive to the idea, some were skeptical.
But that’s the point of a good discussion—to get the ideas out there and to get
people started talking about them.
What struck
me afterwards was that the Science library (Realfagsbiblioteket) has done a fair amount of pimping in
its own right. The beautiful and professionally-done trailers about the invited
scientists who come to the library to hold lectures and workshops are a good
example of the library (KBH and AC) pimping the work and careers of these
scientists; these trailers have been uploaded to SlideShare if you are
interested in seeing them: http://www.slideshare.net/Realfagsbiblioteket/presentations.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
On Twitter: from Zombie Pandemics to the Northern Lights
I continue to do part-time consultant work for the university science library and enjoy it. It's pretty cool to get paid for a job that is actually a lot of fun--maintaining and updating their Facebook and Twitter pages and helping to promote their events (lectures and conferences). It's also pretty amazing what's out there on Twitter. Twitter is a world of its own, and very unlike Facebook, because if you want to keep a professional profile, you can. So I also have a personal Twitter profile now, but have decided to use it to promote scientific and health issues of interest to me. So besides updates from research journals, popular science journals and the like, I also follow the New York Times and a host of different health and charity organizations. And of course it's very interesting the type of people who end up following you, based on your word usage. Your Twitter comments are actually like 'tag bites'. I recently promoted an event for the library that will take place in mid-November--'Pimp your research'--a lecture by the world-renowned bee researcher Gro Amdam, followed by a discussion about how to and whether to make your research sexier. Wouldn't you know it, but the next day, I had three new women following me on Twitter, all of whom were working in the porn industry. It's easy to block these types of people, but it amuses me that your word usage has such an immediate effect. We are being profiled all the time as long as we're online and actively using internet, and anyone who believes otherwise, just doesn't get it or doesn't want to.
This week I have so far stumbled upon two interesting links on Twitter that I want to share with you. The first one is from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia--the city now known for The Walking Dead. The CDC has now published an interesting pamphlet in comic strip form just in time for Halloween, entitled "Preparedness 101: Zombie Pandemic". It's actually quite a clever way of educating people on how to prepare for any type of disaster. You can check it out here: http://www.cdc.gov/phpr/documents/11_225700_A_Zombie_Final.pdf
The other interesting link had to do with the beautiful displays of the Northern Lights in the USA on Monday; folks in the Midwest and even in the Deep South were treated to spectacular light shows courtesy of Mother Nature. The point is that this type of happening is rare, and was due to an intense geomagnetic storm. National Geographic has made available some gorgeous shots of these Northern Lights, and you can see them here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/10/pictures/111025-northern-lights-aurora-borealis-united-states-south/?source=link_tw20111025news-aurora#/northern-lights-aurora-borealis-reach-south-united-states-michigan-trees_42517_600x450.jpg All in all, pretty amazing, and I sure wish I had been there to see them!
Information at our fingertips, all the time if we want it. What a brave new world we live in, and it's mostly within the past ten years that the information highway has grown by leaps and bounds. I remember when I was preparing two lectures in connection with my doctoral defense in 1999; I had to physically walk into the medical library with a list of the articles I needed to be printed out, and the librarians found them for me, or requested them from other libraries, and then printed them out and mailed them to me. In some cases, this could take days or even a week if the journals were not on hand. Nowadays, I can find the articles myself online, print them out at work or at home, and if our library doesn't subscribe to the journal, I can order a copy through the library online and they will fax it to me within a day of my order. Overall, if I need fifty articles, I can find at least ninety-five percent of them myself without help. That's progress. The libraries have adapted to the changes, and now that I do consulting work for a university library, I see just how far they've come. They haven't stuck their heads in the sand and ignored the world around them; they are information providers for the digital age, and if you haven't stuck your head inside a library for a while, I suggest you take a trip to one and check out the changes for yourself. The books are still there, but so are PCs, Macs, iPads, Kindles, digital projectors, SmartBoards and more computers, all ready for use, all offering instant connection to the information highway, which, if used ethically and wisely, is a real time-saver and an endless source of knowledge, even knowledge you didn't set out to find originally.
This week I have so far stumbled upon two interesting links on Twitter that I want to share with you. The first one is from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia--the city now known for The Walking Dead. The CDC has now published an interesting pamphlet in comic strip form just in time for Halloween, entitled "Preparedness 101: Zombie Pandemic". It's actually quite a clever way of educating people on how to prepare for any type of disaster. You can check it out here: http://www.cdc.gov/phpr/documents/11_225700_A_Zombie_Final.pdf
The other interesting link had to do with the beautiful displays of the Northern Lights in the USA on Monday; folks in the Midwest and even in the Deep South were treated to spectacular light shows courtesy of Mother Nature. The point is that this type of happening is rare, and was due to an intense geomagnetic storm. National Geographic has made available some gorgeous shots of these Northern Lights, and you can see them here: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/10/pictures/111025-northern-lights-aurora-borealis-united-states-south/?source=link_tw20111025news-aurora#/northern-lights-aurora-borealis-reach-south-united-states-michigan-trees_42517_600x450.jpg All in all, pretty amazing, and I sure wish I had been there to see them!
Information at our fingertips, all the time if we want it. What a brave new world we live in, and it's mostly within the past ten years that the information highway has grown by leaps and bounds. I remember when I was preparing two lectures in connection with my doctoral defense in 1999; I had to physically walk into the medical library with a list of the articles I needed to be printed out, and the librarians found them for me, or requested them from other libraries, and then printed them out and mailed them to me. In some cases, this could take days or even a week if the journals were not on hand. Nowadays, I can find the articles myself online, print them out at work or at home, and if our library doesn't subscribe to the journal, I can order a copy through the library online and they will fax it to me within a day of my order. Overall, if I need fifty articles, I can find at least ninety-five percent of them myself without help. That's progress. The libraries have adapted to the changes, and now that I do consulting work for a university library, I see just how far they've come. They haven't stuck their heads in the sand and ignored the world around them; they are information providers for the digital age, and if you haven't stuck your head inside a library for a while, I suggest you take a trip to one and check out the changes for yourself. The books are still there, but so are PCs, Macs, iPads, Kindles, digital projectors, SmartBoards and more computers, all ready for use, all offering instant connection to the information highway, which, if used ethically and wisely, is a real time-saver and an endless source of knowledge, even knowledge you didn't set out to find originally.
Friday, October 21, 2011
School days and a lifetime of learning
The autumn
season is always a nice reminder of my school and college years. I can honestly
say that I looked forward to going back to school each year, even though I
always enjoyed having the summers off. Autumn is the start of a new school season,
with all the hype, expectations and focus that a new start entails. That
feeling of starting a new school year has never left me, even though I am far
removed from my school days; I always have a bit of it when I go back to work
after a long summer vacation. But now that I do consulting work for the
university, I feel that sense of ‘new school year’ excitement when I walk past groups
of students gathered nervously together on campus—that sense of anticipation about
new courses, new books, new teachers, new social experiences, and a lot of
studying. I’m glad I’m finished with all that, but it’s interesting to be back
on campus as an adult doing an adult job. I enjoy seeing the students and
remembering back to my own college days at Fordham University. Those years were
something special, and I knew that already at college age. I knew that such an
opportunity to be able to focus and to study uninterruptedly for four years
would never come again. And it’s true, it never did. But those four years were
a wonderful immersion in biology, literature, Spanish, organic chemistry and
history, on a lovely campus in the middle of the Bronx.
I went to
work full-time right after college, halfway through my master’s degree in cell
biology that I ended up finishing at night. I was offered the chance to do a
PhD by professor Loren Day, my biophysicist boss at my first job, but I turned
down the offer so that I could work for some years while I figured out in what field
I wanted to do doctoral work. I knew it would not be biophysics (my first
working lab experience—isolating and purifying bacteriophage DNA in order to
study its helical structure). Although the technology we used at that time was
fascinating, I was more fascinated by the use of computers in the lab—the early
computers that let us feed DNA sequences into crude programs in order to get
back protein sequences, for example. The computers that were programmed to tell
us “Cool your jets, I’m adding up the sites” while we waited for the output.
They were being funny with us, of course programmed to be so by the offbeat
programmers who had offbeat senses of humor. I became friends with Roy, our
resident computer programmer, who showed me how computer circuit boards were designed,
and who was patient enough to explain the chemistry involved in their
manufacture. He taught me the rudiments of the programming language UNIX, and
got me interested in the first small personal computers. My interest in
computers led to my taking a course in FORTRAN and in machine language at New
York University, courses that I have never regretted taking. I hit the wall countless
times, but I managed to pass both courses and I learned some really cool things
in the process, like how to move 0’s and 1’s around in the data and address registers
that make up the CPU. This binary language is the language needed to talk to
the guts of the computer; the executable programs that are written in higher
level languages like FORTRAN in the early days and in C++ nowadays are
translated to executable machine (binary) code by a compiler and linker. So I waded
carefully into the programming waters, but I was not clever enough to continue
in this field even though it interested me tremendously. I don’t regret this
decision, because biology was and still is the field of study that interests me
the most, with literature a close second. The exposure to computers and to
complex instrumentation in my first job laid the groundwork for my next job,
which was to be the daily leader of a flow cytometry core facility at Memorial Sloan-Kettering
Cancer Center. Laser flow cytometers/sorters were used to analyze different
cellular parameters and to physically sort different cell types from each
other; most of them were coupled to computers that were programmed to run these
instruments and to perform the complex analyses involved. When I look back to
that time, the 1980s, I remember it as a phenomenal time in terms of learning.
The use of flow cytometry in biological and cancer research was just taking
off, and it was fun to be a part of it, attending courses in Boston (sponsored
by Ortho Diagnostic Systems) to learn how to run these complicated instruments,
as well as a course in Los Alamos, New Mexico at the government lab there to learn
how high-speed flow sorters were being used to sort chromosomes and to make
chromosome libraries, among other important things. We learned how to do some
pretty novel stuff at that course, and got a chance to see a lot of New Mexico
in the process. I joined the Society for Analytical Cytology (SAC) that later became
the International Society for Analytical Cytometry (ISAC); I have attended countless
conferences in different countries since 1985, but the conference that stands
out is the one at Cambridge University in England in August 1987. It was here that I met Trond, the Norwegian man who became my husband. It was also my
first trip to Europe alone; my lodging was a student dormitory room not far
from the building where the conference was held. All conference attendees lived
in this way for the week we were there. I loved the feeling of living in the
dorm; it was a monastic room, simple, small, with very little furniture save
the bed and a desk. But it gave me a real feeling of what it must have been
like to study at Cambridge, and the city itself was attractive with its many
bookstores and music stores. All I know is that one day I hope to really study
there—to take a literature course of some sort during the summer months. It’s
on my bucket list.
Maybe it’s
not so strange that I ended up in academia. I don’t teach, even though I have
achieved the level of professor competence. I prefer to mentor students on a one-to-one
basis or in small groups, and I still like being in the lab from time to time.
I don’t like bureaucracy, power politics, or the ‘publish or perish’ mentality
of academia. What I do like is the ability and privilege that we have to
immerse ourselves in lifelong learning if we want to, and I try to take
advantage of this as much as possible. Because life is short, but also because
society is changing at a rapid rate, and has changed immensely within the last
thirty years. Being able to keep up with the rapid change is important, and the
only way we can do that is to remain open to learning for the rest of our lives.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
American science and the future of cancer research
Harold
Varmus, the current director of the National Cancer Institute in the USA, held a talk
yesterday at a conference on life sciences for health and innovation at
Rikshospitalet in Oslo. He won the Nobel Prize in 1989 for the discovery of the
‘cellular origin of retroviral oncogenes’ together with J. Michael Bishop. The
title of his talk was ‘Why medical research matters’, and he did a pretty good
job of presenting all the arguments for why medical research does in fact
matter. But his talk was mostly about the glorious success that American
science has enjoyed since WWII, and how the country—both the government and the
American people—were in complete agreement about the importance of science to
the future of American society. And what a glorious history the USA has had
when it comes to science during the past seventy years. It was not difficult
following the war to convince the American people of the importance of having a
strong scientific base and community. Being able to defend the USA was an
important motive for driving scientific endeavors, as Varmus pointed out. For
example, the space program was implemented in order to be able to compete with
the Soviets in space. It is safe to say that emphasis on defense in terms of
technology and weapons was sufficient to push many scientific endeavors forward
during the period from 1950-1980. But what Varmus also emphasized was the sheer
amount of scientific discoveries during the past seventy years, an astounding
number—that have led us to the point where we are today. He was also keen to
point out that science is important for its own sake—that curiosity about,
interest in, and the pursuit of basic research are valuable things in and of
themselves. Basic research should not be discouraged according to Varmus. We
cannot just emphasize innovation and translational research at the expense of
basic research. He pointed out that many basic research discoveries were not
translated into anything of practical use for perhaps decades after their
discovery. Despite this fact, Varmus argued that this was the way science should
proceed—that an emphasis on innovation should not necessarily be the major
focus moving forward. And I agree. I don’t know to what extent the research
climate has changed in America during the past ten years. What I know is that
it has changed dramatically in Norway during the same period. There are
advantages and disadvantages as with all changes. I’ve written about both in
previous posts. I am not opposed to change. But it is clear that innovations
and patents are being emphasized to a large degree to the detriment of free
independent basic research. We should not be skimping on basic research in the
rush to commercialize scientific findings.
I was heartened by Varmus’ positive
presentation of American science, especially since I started out as a scientist
in this type of research atmosphere during the 1980s and can attest to its
veracity. I have often talked about working in dynamic research environments (Memorial
Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and UCSF) when I worked in the USA. They were
dynamic—they were inspiring, encouraging, educational—for all sorts of reasons,
but mostly because the men and women who led the research groups were dynamic individuals
who loved science. They lived for science—it was not a part of their lives, it
was their lives. You can argue the wisdom of this type of lifestyle as much as
you want for my sake. I know all the arguments against it—that it cuts into
family life, that there is no time for social events, and so on. But these
people socialized with other scientists and their families. They talked a lot
about science and new ideas and approaches with their families. Their wives and
husbands and children were an integral part of their scientific lives. And
being around these types of scientists was a positive experience. It’s sad to
hear about and to witness the economic hard times that the USA is currently
experiencing; Varmus also meant that the American people have become much more
negative and conservative when it comes to wanting to fund science. That’s sad
to hear. It’s hard to say if the USA will recover, and even if it does,
difficult to say whether the excellence that has defined most of the research
will continue. If science does not have the backing of the American people, it
will not get the funding it needs to continue, because the politicians that
will be voted in will support the views of their constituents. Has America
peaked in terms of its scientific prowess? Is it now time for the USA to hand over
the relay for other countries to carry? I hope not.
Varmus also
talked about cancer research and how the NCI has taken the initiative to start
a new project called Provocative Questions. This list of 24 questions resulted
from discussions at workshops for scientists at the NCI, where the scientists who
got together discussed and debated the current state of affairs for
cancer-related issues—e.g. drug resistance, metastasis—and came up with some
new questions and approaches for doing cancer research in the years to come (http://provocativequestions.nci.nih.gov/rfa).
Some of the questions that have made the list of Provocative Questions are: How does
obesity contribute to cancer risk? What environmental factors change the risk
of various cancers when people move from one geographic region to another? Are
there ways to objectively ascertain exposure to cancer risk using modern
measurement technologies? Why don't
more people alter behaviors known to increase the risk of cancers? How do changes in
RNA processing contribute to tumor development? Why are some disseminated
cancers cured by chemotherapy alone? Given the appearance of resistance in
response to cell killing therapies, can we extend survival by using approaches
that keep tumors static? These are all good questions, and hopefully the scientists of the future
will be interested in studying them. I hope that the quality of American
science continues to be high, but I know that it won’t remain that way without
a concerted effort and focus on the part of politicians and the public alike.
The public has got to believe, has got to be convinced, that science pays off.
And not necessarily commercially, but from the standpoint of helping cure different
diseases down the road, and in aiding in the development of new technologies. The
only way to ensure this is to communicate
the importance of science whenever one gets the opportunity to do so, using all
media available, e.g. social media like blogs, Facebook and Twitter. The world
has changed, science and the way science is done and communicated has changed—perhaps
we are ushering in a new era for science—a ‘brave new world’--we are part of the change. It is happening
around us, and perhaps we will not recognize what was when the changes are
complete. It is exhilarating to think about being part of the change. I thought
about that today on my way to hear yet another lecture by another Nobel Prize
winner—Ivar Giæver. I thought—there are so many opportunities for younger
people now to get introduced to science and research. They are so lucky
compared to when we started out. Now they have computers, internet, social
media, apps of all kinds, virtual learning, interactive learning and so on. There
is a plethora of courses, conferences, lectures, idea festivals, all designed
with young people—students--in mind. But these are not enough. Students have to
experience the exhilaration of working for a dynamic scientific leader who does
basic research and who is a visionary--not a bureaucrat or a technocrat. That’s
what matters for the future, that’s what will hook students and keep them interested in
doing basic research.
Friday, September 9, 2011
Musings about science and scientists, and the weather
I’ve been
at a scientific conference (dealing with the cell cycle and regulators of cell
proliferation) most of the week; it started on Monday night and ended this
morning. I wasn’t able to attend all the sessions each day, but I managed to be
present for some really top-notch lectures delivered by Nobel prize winners and
international experts in their respective fields. That’s always an encouraging
and inspiring experience; it reminds me of why I chose this profession—a scientific
research career, when I hear top speakers talk about their work. Many of the
top speakers were older men who more or less summed up their research careers
in their lectures. I have more appreciation for that type of lecture now—maybe because
I’ve been in research a long time myself. I know the ins and outs and ups and
downs of this business, and I appreciate hearing the opinions advanced by these
speakers, because they know what they’re talking about. So when a few of them
talk about the importance of small research groups as opposed to large ones, I’m
suddenly all ears. I agree with them. Small groups are the places where
innovative ideas are born. We should not be getting rid of small research
groups. We should not be discouraging younger people from pursuing academic
careers. But the granting powers that be are doing so. By not funding
scientists who lead small research groups, they ensure that younger
scientists cannot continue because they will never get the chance to start their own small groups. By not encouraging younger scientists to fly free
rather than clipping their wings which happens all the time now, we are
eliminating the pool of future scientists that each society so absolutely requires. Younger scientists are
leaving academia. There is no place for most of them. There are no jobs for
them and there is no real future for them. This is confirmed for me at most
conferences. Younger scientists in this country (post-doc level and above) are
little more than slaves for their group leaders. They are doing two and three
post-doc periods and finding themselves without any prospects after they
finish. They are not being offered staff scientist positions or group leader
status. They’re rather told that they’re too aggressive or too independent. And
they are, of course. Who wouldn’t be after three post-doc periods? That’s the
point of post-doc periods—to create independence and self-sufficiency in
intelligent and enthusiastic scientists. But their wings are being clipped in
huge numbers, and the granting situation for the future will ensure that there
will eventually be no post-doc or staff scientist positions at all. But there
will be a lot of PhD student positions. God knows what this country will do
with all the new PhD recipients. There aren’t jobs for them. And little is
being done to create new jobs for them. Many of them will end up as salespeople
or will leave the profession for greener pastures. The only reason there are currently
so many PhD positions is because the principal investigators who run research groups
need slaves and lots of hands to do their work for them while they are busy
writing grants and networking with their fellow group leaders. They know there
is no real research future for the PhDs they’re turning out, either in academia
or in industry. And industry is not really stepping up to the plate to meet the
future needs either.
The meeting
was held at the Holmenkollen Park Rica Hotel at the top of the city of Oslo,
literally. On a clear day, there is an amazing view of the fjord and of the
city from this vantage point. But of course, the weather this past week was not
cooperative, so the hilltop and hotel were mostly shrouded in fog, and when
there wasn’t fog, it was raining. I cannot remember a summer like this one—it has
rained steadily, if not daily, at least several times per week. The
non-Norwegians at the meeting were asking me if the weather was always like
this. It isn’t. Today was a perfect example. The last day of the meeting is of
course when the sun chose to reappear and blue skies took over--just perfect
for walking. So I walked to work from the top of the city to my hospital. It
took me about an hour door to door. Relaxing and enjoyable to walk downhill for
the most part, take in the nature around me, and just enjoy being outdoors in
the sunshine. It was a sharp contrast to Tuesday night, when the entire meeting
was treated to a boat trip on the fjord. It happened to take place on exactly
the one night of the summer when a storm (remnants of Hurricane Irene in fact)
blew into Oslo, causing flooding and all sorts of other problems. We did sail out
on the fjord though—the trip was not cancelled. We stayed more or less on the inner
fjord, so the waves were not very high. The boat was quite large so it was
actually not a problem to be out on the water. But the wind whipped the sails
about and the rain was unrelenting, so we were forced into the boat’s innards
where dinner awaited, and that was cozy. People had a good time and that was
the most important thing. I know that the foreigners at the meeting will
remember this particular trip. It’s not often you get to sail on a boat during
a fairly intense storm.
It was heartening
to meet a lot of the scientists who were at this conference. For some reason,
most of the top scientists who attended were actually quite down-to-earth
people—friendly, interested in others, and interesting to talk to. It made me
wonder about the correlation between real intelligence and humility. If you are
really intelligent, perhaps you don’t need to flaunt it or to treat other
people poorly. So perhaps this is one explanation for what I see in my
workplace—several rude people who think they are intelligent (but who really
are not), and who need to be arrogant and rude to others because they are
insecure about their intelligence. They need to make others feel inferior in
order for them to feel superior. Kind of makes sense to me now. This has been
reinforced for me by some of the lecturers I have had the privilege of listening
to at the Science library at the University of Oslo. They have been given by
some really incredible human beings, people you’d be proud to know. This gives
me hope for the future of science generally.
Friday, June 3, 2011
Work-life balance in Norway
The Huffington Post just published a list of the 10 countries worldwide that have the best work-life balance; Denmark topped the list, followed by Norway in the number two spot. Finland and Sweden also made the list, as did the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Portugal and Germany. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/01/top-ten-countries-with-work-life-balance_n_868224.html#s285271&title=1_Denmark
The USA was conspicuously absent. The work-life balance as defined by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) was assessed using three indicators: “(1) the amount of time spent on personal activities; (2) the employment rate of women with children between 6 and 14 years of age; and (3) the number of employees working over 50 hours a week”. Scandinavia in other words has a good work-life balance, meaning that work life does not eat up all free time, leaving time for personal activities and for child-raising. After living here for over twenty years, I can attest to the fact that there is a good work-life balance here. But I also have to say that after studying and working in New York City for over ten years prior to moving to Norway, it took me a long time to let go of the idea that I had to work long hours to get ahead, to have a successful career. So when I first moved to Norway, I worked long hours, as did my husband who is Norwegian. We are both scientists, so there is no fixed time that one must spend in the lab. Your weekly hours are often defined by the types of experiments you are doing that week in the lab. Sometimes the experiments required 60-70 hour weeks. Sometimes they required that we worked one or both weekend days. The life of a scientist is not really a 9 to 5 affair. But I see now that the younger scientists are making it so. They are getting their experiments done between 9am and 4pm, because many of them have to leave then to pick up their children from daycare. There are a lot of factors that figure into this new equation; young couples make deals with each other—one drops off the child in the morning and the other picks up the child in the afternoon. Maybe they alternate weeks or months—such that each person gets a chance to stay a bit longer at work if necessary. But by and large, they are better than my husband and I were at leaving work at a decent hour each day. I often say to my stepdaughter that I wish we had spent more time with her when she was growing up. Not that it seems to have affected her too much that we worked late hours or talked a lot about science when she was a child. She has also chosen a career in science, as has her husband.
The point is that it’s possible to have a good career here without killing yourself, without working 70-80 hour weeks. But that’s where the problem begins for foreigners who work here, and I am not just speaking for myself now. You come to Scandinavia with your expertise, competence and willingness to work hard and to make a good impression. You end up working overtime and it is not necessarily looked upon favorably. It does not score you any extra points as it might in the USA. In fact the opposite is true, you might be viewed rather suspiciously—why are you working so hard when the others around you have gone home? What is it you are trying to prove? Are you trying to make the others look bad? It was exceedingly hard for me to accept that this is how I might have been viewed at one point when I had first come to Norway. One of the elderly professors at my institute—who did appreciate long hours and hard work—often said that if he was at work late, he knew that it was only foreigners who were there working late along with him. The Norwegians had gone home for the day. This is not absolutely true. I know a number of Norwegian medical doctors and scientists who put in long hours each day. But overall, the general attitude is that it is not necessary to kill yourself, so if you choose to do so, you do so at your own ‘risk’ without promise of reward. You do so because you absolutely love what you do; you might even be slightly obsessed with your work—a workaholic. I was one for a while. I am not one anymore, for a number of reasons. But ultimately, it becomes hard to not be influenced by the society you live in. In the beginning, I worked overtime, worked holidays, and took short summer vacations, simply because that is the way I did things in New York. My husband, who also loved his work, did the same. Our life proceeded in this way for about fifteen or so years; after that a lot of things changed, especially for me. Suffice it to say that hard work does not always yield the expected rewards. I don’t regret working so hard, but I don’t work that hard anymore. The problem with letting go of the ‘work hard’ ethic was the guilt associated with giving up my intense work ethic. Believe me, guilt is real. It nags at you. It tells you that you should be working when you are doing something fun. I’m past the guilt now. I will never be Norwegian, but I have adopted the Scandinavian work ethic. And in the process, I have learned something about myself and about the society here. It is possible to get a lot done in a shorter amount of time. It is possible to let go of the idea of having to be at work and having to be so incredibly efficient all the time. It is possible to not be a robot for the company you work for. And by letting go of my workaholic life, I found time for my hobbies—writing, photography, biking, cultural events, and so forth. Not that I didn’t try to do these things when I was working 70-80 hour weeks; just that it wasn’t always feasible because I was so tired. And that’s the main difference now. If I go home at 5pm, I have an evening ahead of me—to plan as I want. It may mean dinner out for me and my husband, or it may mean that I have more time to prepare a good dinner at home. It means that we can take a walk in the evening without feeling exhausted; it means that we don’t just come home anymore and collapse in front of the TV, dead tired after a long day in the lab.
Why is it possible to have a good career here without having to kill yourself with overwork? Because at some point, you hit the salary ceiling. For example, as senior scientists, we make decent salaries and get cost-of-living raises each year (and sometimes small merit salary increases if we have done something extra special during the year). But we know that we are never going to get huge raises, and there is a ceiling above which we cannot rise unless our job title changes to Research director or Hospital director. So staff scientists who have worked in their positions for a number of years, cannot rise very far salary-wise above their fellow staff scientists, thanks in part to the union we belong to, which ensures each year that the small amount of money appropriated for individual merit raises gets spread fairly among the members. You can rebel against this idea, or you can learn to accept it. Either way, you won’t find yourself in a ‘special’ or ‘favored’ position. That’s just the way it works here. The ‘goods’ get spread around, like it or not. And sometimes I haven’t liked it because it means that the lazy workers benefit in the same way as the hard workers. The hard workers are not necessarily rewarded. That’s the flip side of the coin. That’s the negative aspect that you simply have to learn to swallow. You’re on your honor here. If you slack off, you get paid anyway, and you most likely will not get fired. Workers’ rights are strong here—very protected. If you work overtime, you won’t get paid any more than someone who works normal hours, at least not in academia. So you end up choosing to work normal hours, to value your free time, to use your vacation time (30 days each year), to take a week off at Christmas and at Easter, and to sometimes leave work early in the spring and summer when the sun appears. After twenty years in Norway, I understand why people leave work early when the sun comes out to go sit outdoors in cafes and restaurants, or at seaside cottages, or wherever. Because the sun is to be worshipped---the months of summer pass quickly and then we are back to the dark winters again. I have learned. I love the sun, I love my free time, and I look forward to summer vacation. There is something to be said for an easier and more peaceful life after years of working long hours, overtime, and intense striving, first in NY and then in Norway during the first ten years or so until I finished my doctorate. I’ve let go of my earlier intense work ethic after some internal resistance, and I can honestly say that I don’t miss it. I still have a strong work ethic, but I've made room for the other things in my life that are just as important, if not more important, than work alone. That's what balance means, and when I was younger, I didn't have that balance between work and life outside of work.
Monday, January 10, 2011
The New Science and Math Library at the University of Oslo
The University of Oslo will be building a new, modern Science and Math library in the Vilhelm Bjerknes' building. Renovations and construction will begin in the Vilhelm Bjerknes' building at the end of February / beginning of March. When the new library is completed in 2012, it will be actively used for debate and discussion about science and the importance of science to society.
There were some wonderfully interesting Arrangements at the Library during 2010--Bill Bryson, Marcus du Sautoy, Karen Lunsford, and Drew Endy held exciting lectures that had their audiences enthralled. There was a really interesting lecture by Ellen Henriksen followed by a panel debate about young women and why they don't choose careers in math and science. There were two important, exciting, and well-attended conferences--the BioConference 2010 with its Biodiversity theme, and the Bioinformatics Conference. There will be more Arrangements in 2011. Follow the Facebook page during 2011 to stay up-to-date on all of the new and exciting Arrangements that the Library is planning! Stay tuned......
For those of you who cannot read Norwegian, you can become fans of the Facebook page anyway! Google Translate is a wonderful tool that I use a lot now to go back and forth between English and several languages. It will help you translate the site to English. The translations may be a little weird at times, but you'll get the gist of what is going on at the Library. It is a dynamic, forward-thinking, and future-focused library headed by women who are all these things and more.
For those of you who cannot read Norwegian, you can become fans of the Facebook page anyway! Google Translate is a wonderful tool that I use a lot now to go back and forth between English and several languages. It will help you translate the site to English. The translations may be a little weird at times, but you'll get the gist of what is going on at the Library. It is a dynamic, forward-thinking, and future-focused library headed by women who are all these things and more.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Bacteria bubble lamps, iGEM, and future visions
This past Tuesday the New Science and Math library at the University of Oslo (in collaboration with The Norwegian Biotechnology Advisory Board) welcomed Drew Endy from Stanford University and a team of students from Cambridge University. They were there to talk about synthetic biology—Drew Endy defined what it is and how he envisions its future uses. He also talked about its impact on society and the potential ethical and moral issues involved in its use. The students were there to present their iGEM (International Genetically Engineered Machine competition) project for 2010—an E.coli bubble lamp—essentially E.coli bacteria that have been genetically-modified to become a living bioluminescent ‘lamp’. You can see their ‘product’ here in this YouTube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?hl=en&v=tUFscEVK5Ks. There were four students and all of them wore T-shirts with the words ‘E. glowli’ written on them. They had their presentation before Drew’s lecture, and they held their audience captive for over thirty minutes with what they had to say. They envisioned a future where London was lit by such ‘living lamps’. But what struck me most of all about them was the (high) levels of enthusiasm and interest they had in science and in what they were doing. They believed in what they were doing. They were not fanatical; they just loved their work. You could tell they weren’t just doing it for the fame and glory, even though they have achieved some of that. Mostly they were just enjoying what they were doing and they weren’t afraid to impart that message. And as an audience, you could not help but be inspired by them. You couldn’t help but smile. These students are not jaded, cynical bureaucrats; they are already budding scientists and who knows what lies in store for them? Who knows how far they can go before a bureaucratic daily life confronts them and tries to slow them down? The danger is not that they get completely or immediately discouraged. The danger is that they get slowly discouraged—a gradual, slow, insidious process that leads to a loss of morale and enthusiasm over time. I don’t know what I have to do to prevent that from happening, but whatever it is I will do it. I will be a cheerleader for the other side—the side that says let students do science and let scientists do science. Science students deserve a chance to love science. They deserve a chance to come up with new ideas, test them out, compete with others, and to learn by trial and error. We had that chance in our generation. I still love science. I just don’t love the administrative infrastructure that has built itself up around the practice of science, which has led to scientific daily life being over-administrated by budgets and accountants and unnecessary amounts of paperwork.
All of the conferences and lectures I have been to at the New Science and Math library this autumn (and helped promote on their Facebook and Twitter pages—my consulting job this autumn) have helped to restore my love of and enthusiasm about science. You’ll find the New Science and Math library Facebook page here https://www.facebook.com/realfagsbiblioteket. This autumn has rejuvenated my love for science in so many forms—synthetic, ecological, marine, and polar biology, math, physics; try and explain them to me in concrete, interesting and enthusiastic ways and you’ll find a willing listener and an enthusiastic supporter. And it was clear from the public attendance at these lectures that there were many others who felt the same way. But please don’t talk to us just about impact factors, making money, patents, innovations, which research group is the best and which group is the worst. Deliver us from small-minded, petty and envious principal investigators. Give me instead the principal investigators who think big even if they have small research groups (I know a few), who have visions, enthusiasm, and ideas about the future and who like their students and encourage them rather than being threatened by their intelligence. Drew Endy did not appear to be threatened by the iGEM students from Cambridge. He was proud of them. There was a good rapport between them. There is some really good science being done at the University of Oslo and the Norwegian University of Life Science at Aas and at other research and educational institutions in Norway. But its promotion has to come from the scientists themselves (not from bureaucrats), or from scientists who don’t want to do bench work anymore but who are willing to promote the cause of science in order to inspire future generations of science students, or from science librarians, or from a combination of all three groups. The combination idea seems to be gaining support, which is wonderful—real teamwork! Hopefully, science-interested parties at the University of Oslo will set the wheels in motion to build up a UiO iGEM team after having heard about how well the lecture and iGEM presentation went on Tuesday afternoon at the New Science and Math library. All I can say is—go for it!
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Exploitation of good scientists and the perpetuation of lies
Yesterday was one of those days that tested my patience big-time and I don’t think I passed the test. The day started out with a seminar (sponsored by Forskerforbundet) dealing with the problem of the lack of permanent positions for research scientists in Norway. Some of the lectures were good, others were not. I left the seminar during the early afternoon feeling a bit provoked by several of the lectures. One of the speakers (who belongs to an elite group of MD scientists that are well-funded with big research groups) was trying to defend his (and the new hospital conglomerate’s) position concerning keeping non-MD scientists working in temporary positions in biomedical research. His line of defense was that the lack of permanent (‘tenured’) positions keeps scientists competitive and on the cutting-edge and that to ‘reward’ them with a permanent stable job would take that edge away and lead to mediocrity. He also said that there was no fate worse than being a poor to mediocre scientist—that this was a fate worse than death in his estimation. I am sure he managed to alienate a good number of scientists sitting in the audience who perhaps have had problems recently producing enough articles to qualify for the status of good scientist. Because that is how this speaker defines a good scientist—as a researcher who produces a good number of articles per year. How lucky for him—he has a huge group while the majority of the scientists sitting in the audience do not. It was easy for him to reveal his arrogance and it was infuriating to listen to because he displayed no understanding whatsoever for the current situation that many non-MD scientists find themselves in these days.
I realize that when I talk about academic biomedical science in Norway, there is no possible way for those outside of the system and the country to understand how unbelievably elitist the system has been for so many years. It is not possible to understand it without knowledge of the history that underlies the elitism. Biomedical research science has mostly been done by MDs for years, and the system is set up so as to prioritize, promote and to reward MDs who want to do research. Years ago this meant that MDs who had hospital jobs could do research on the side; it perhaps would be better to say that they were provided with technicians who did the lab work for them and provided the doctors with data so that they could write articles. If they accumulated enough articles they could submit a thesis with these articles and defend it, obtaining the degree of doctor of medicine (corresponding to a PhD degree in other countries). Doctors could go into the lab and do some of the research work if they wanted, but they did not have to—it was not a requirement for the degree. They could take as long as they wanted to finish the degree and they were often in their forties when they finished. This was the way it was done when I started working at my hospital’s research institute twenty years ago. The PhD system has changed over the years, but doctors are still prioritized when they start PhD programs from the standpoint that they are often offered technical help while non-MD PhD students are not. This has never sat well with me because as far as I am concerned, if both groups start a PhD program and are doing it full-time, as is the case with the new system, I don’t understand why the MD-PhD students should get preferential treatment. But they still do, at least at my hospital. At one point they also got a slightly higher salary than non-MD PhD students, although this is not the case anymore. All of this was and is done to encourage MDs to get interested in research and to take PhD degrees. That looks good for a hospital trying to present itself as a research hospital. The sad thing is that my hospital has never been particularly interested in promoting its non-MD PhD students or scientists. I find it sad because implicit in this philosophy is the idea that MDs have a better grip on biomedical research problems than non-MDs. I simply don’t buy into this philosophy. It has gotten better in the past five or so years, such that non-MDs who are doing biomedical research have better chances at making it in the system than they used to. But there is still a long way to go. It is strange that already during the 1980s in New York City at Sloan-Kettering Cancer Research Institute it was not a problem for non-MDs to lead major biomedical research programs. The same was and is true of the University of California at San Francisco during the early 1990s. There were a number of non-MD staff scientists at both places working on biomedical/cancer research projects and/or leading those programs. MDs and non-MDs also worked together in teams and it worked just fine. That’s how it should be—teamwork—a team of equals. I could continue on down the list of institutions where this worked. In Norway, I just don’t get it. I’ve been told that non-MD researchers cannot teach in medical school—again I don’t understand why they couldn’t teach histology or pathology or cell biology, if they’ve specialized in these fields and taken their PhDs in them. I know non-MD scientists in the USA who taught medical school courses and who were appointed to professorships in clinical specialties without having an MD. But that’s the USA. No matter how many times I’ve been told that the USA is elitist, capitalistic, competitive (ad nauseum) in its approach to most things, I can tell you that I have never experienced as much elitism in biomedical research science as I have in Norway. The discrimination is against non-MD biomedical research scientists.
So that leads me to the current problem with lack of job stability for non-MD biomedical research scientists. It’s a complicated situation. Over the past twenty years, common practice was that non-MD PhD students finished their PhDs and started their post-doctoral positions, often in the same lab or in the same institute because mobility was not encouraged and there were too few corporate/industry jobs available anyway (unless they wanted to work in marketing or sales). They were encouraged to continue on an academic track because the MDs leading the research programs saw an opportunity to utilize their competence to help new PhD students and MDs who wanted to do some research but did not want to commit full-time at the outset. The non-MD post-docs wanted to please their group leaders and they wanted some sort of job because they liked biomedical research, so they stayed put and did what they were told and did not react when they realized they were being misused. The group leaders could extend their post-doc positions (via external funding) so that many of them ended up working three post-doc periods in a row (a total of 9 to 12 years). This is not done in the USA. Some of them were told they could work as scientists (also up to 9 years split over three periods). For many non-MD scientists this could mean up to 21 years in untenured positions. This is what happened to many of the non-MD scientists in my generation. When they reached middle age they were out of a job because external funding for their positions ran out. It was ‘expected’ that the hospitals would employ them permanently full-time. When they appealed to their hospitals for help, they were told that there was not enough money to employ them all in permanent positions (which was the case from the start point but they were not told this). Or they were told that they were ‘good but not good enough’, in other words, mediocre--the ‘fate worse than death’ according to the elitist lecturer—whose suggestion would then be to ‘run along’ and find something else to do and let the ‘best’ scientists run the show. Along the way some of the non-MD scientists figured this crap out and started new jobs elsewhere, perhaps working as salespeople in industry (there were very few possibilities outside of academic research science to do research if you had a PhD during the 1990s). This led to the current situation in some hospital research institutes—at one institute alone there are almost fifty scientists ‘waiting’ for a job, all of whom have done very good work. It’s not that they cannot leave and find another job elsewhere. But perhaps they don’t want to because they’ve invested twenty years in one field—or they have students for whom they are mentors, or a number of reasons, all of which make sense in one way or another except to hospital leadership who now want to be rid of them. I think the system as it has been in Norway is a brutal one, much more brutal than in the USA, where you are often finished with your PhD in your mid-twenties and your post-doc period by the time you are thirty years old. By that time, your mentor has essentially given you an indication of whether or not you should continue in academia or not, or maybe you’ve figured it out for yourself. If you don’t want to continue in academia, you have many jobs to move into in the corporate and R&D world. Or you can work in civil service, or in pharmaceutical firms. It is not a problem to find a job outside of academia. That has not been the case in Norway. Norway did not plan on having so many non-MDs take PhD degrees and then want to actually use those degrees afterwards.
So what are non-MD scientists who want to do academic biomedical research facing these days? Budget cuts, very few jobs, defensive hospital leadership who know they have a real problem on their hands, a cutthroat competitive environment that in and of itself competes with a socialist undercurrent telling the scientists that they can make it because everyone is equal (such crap—everyone cannot be the best). But do they hear this from the (MD) group leaders they work for? No, because these leaders don’t want to lose their gravy trains—a pool of slave labor that is afraid to open its mouth because if it does, the individual scientists will be labeled as difficult and not team players and they will lose their ‘chance’ at any permanent position that arises. It is an unfair system and it needs to be ripped wide open and exposed for what it is—exploitation of good scientists and the perpetuation of the major lie—that there is a permanent position for each of them—‘just wait around long enough and it will happen’. But it doesn’t and the longer one waits the harder it gets to find something else—because when you are in your fifties, you are considered old in terms of being hired for a new job. My advice to the younger students—know what you are choosing if you choose to remain in academic biomedical research science—you are choosing a dearth of jobs, an uncertain future, a cutthroat environment, competition with MDs for program leaderships and an essentially anonymous identity and existence to hospital leadership.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Women and careers in science
I attended a seminar entitled ’Young Women and Science’ this past Monday afternoon at the Science Library at the University of Oslo that began with an excellent lecture about the topic by a woman named Ellen K. Henriksen who is an associate professor of physics at the University of Oslo. Her talk was followed by an hour-long panel debate about the topic that was very interesting and that touched on a number of issues that could explain why young women are not choosing to pursue science studies or careers in science generally. Dr. Henriksen focused on several research studies that have shown that there are two areas that preoccupy women when it comes to choosing to pursue science studies. The first is that many of them feel that they simply are not smart enough to pursue a career in science—that they will not be good at it or master what they need to master, and the second has to do with the fact that many women want their careers to be meaningful—to feel that they are helping others in society by their work. Many of them thus move away from pursuing the harder sciences like mathematics, chemistry and physics that often lead to academic careers, into medicine and health-related studies. The panel debate focused quite a bit on the importance of smart and enthusiastic teachers in helping to get students hooked on math and science. The lack of such teachers in grade school and high school was held up as a contributing factor for why students (girls and boys) simply don’t choose science these days. The other aspect that was brought up was the lack of role models for women in science. Some of the women scientists in the audience meant that there were no role models, or only one or two when they were younger and wondering what path to take, but that they chose to pursue a career in science despite this lack, but that for many women, the prospect of working in a male-dominated profession for the rest of their working lives was simply not attractive from a professional standpoint. The men on the panel, both in their sixties, also bemoaned the lack of women in their fields and meant that it was important to have a gender balance if it could be achieved. The debate created more questions than it answered, as always with a good debate; it was interesting to listen to and to think about afterwards.
I was lucky to have had two very smart female teachers in high school, one of whom taught math (geometry and trigonometry) and the other who taught advanced biology. Both teachers were inspiring and both encouraged their students to do the best job they could. The advanced biology course ended up being mostly independent study because the teacher was also the assistant principal and was quite busy. She gave us the structure we needed but left us mostly alone to pursue the studies she had set out for us. They consisted of three different projects that we had to complete over the course of one year: learning the anatomy of the cat using a full skeleton to learn the arrangement and names of the different bones; learning basic Mendelian genetics by breeding and crossing fruit flies to get progeny that we could observe and classify; and learning how to map gene loci on different chromosomes. I loved this course and it led to my choosing to major in biology in college. Besides basic biology, I took zoology, microbiology, histology and embryology/developmental biology in college (Fordham University ), and advanced cell biology and molecular biology in graduate school (New York University ). I did quite well in undergraduate chemistry (inorganic and organic; I loved organic chemistry), but was not so comfortable with either physics or calculus, possibly because the teachers were rather uninspired. I decided fairly early on during college that I did not want to pursue a career in medicine. And even though I loved studying literature as much as science, I knew that I would earn more money in a scientific career of some sort, which was important at that time because I had to be able to support myself once I got out of college. I started my first job as a research technician at a research institute in Manhattan while I was still in graduate school. The research institute was not far from New York University medical school where many of the institute researchers taught. In graduate school I took not only biology courses but computer science courses: one to learn Fortran, an advanced computer programming language; and the other to learn machine language, which is the most basic language that the computer ‘understands’. It was fascinating because we learned about addresses and memory and registers and how to ‘talk’ directly to the computer’s CPU. While I have forgotten most of it, I remember thinking it was such a cool thing to study when I was in my twenties. After one year of classes and lab work in graduate school I started working full-time at the research institute and finished my degree (writing my thesis) at night and on weekends. I mention all of this because at the time I studied science and computer science, I don’t remember that I worried all that much about whether or not I could master this or that subject. Thus, when I was younger, I didn’t worry about the first of the two considerations that young women at present have when choosing whether or not to pursue science. I took the courses I had to take to get my degrees and got good enough grades for the most part. I did hit the wall once with an advanced biochemistry course (that I dropped out of) taught by a particularly boring teacher who disappeared halfway through the semester and then returned for the final exam. No one knew where he had gone and the university did not fire him because he gotten a prize or two and that is a prestigious thing for a university. Prizes bring fame, attention and money in the form of grants and endowments. And universities often keep bad teachers on staff because they may be good researchers.
Recently, I started to think about the higher-academic level women (PhD and beyond) I’ve met and gotten to know since I first started working in science. There aren’t all that many, to be sure. There were only two women with professor positions in my first job (one was close to eighty years old at that time and the other woman worked for her); the majority of such positions were filled by men at that institute. The three women who worked together in the lab with me in my second job at a top cancer research institute were all post-docs when I started working there. Only one went on to become a professor at a nearby university; eventually all three left academic science. One went on to medical school and became a radiologist, the other moved into industry and became head of global marketing for an international scientific company, and the other moved into university administration and is currently the president of a large city college. They were my role models at the time that I worked together with them, because they were dynamic women with doctorates in their respective fields and because they were enthusiastic about what they did. I remember sitting in taxis together with them on our way to one or another conference, talking about our careers and what we wanted to do and how the sky was the limit. We were young and the world was our oyster. It was an inspiring time that I am grateful to have experienced.
Ironically enough, at the same time that the sciences are having problems recruiting new students, academic science is becoming more difficult to get a foothold in or to remain in, for a number of reasons, some of which have to do with lack of funding, smaller budgets, more ruthless competition, and so on. I have reached a certain plateau—senior scientist with professor competence. I have been a project leader, a section leader, and am now considered a group leader even though I have no real group to lead! Besides myself, there is one other woman at my workplace who could be considered my peer. She is a formal professor and a group leader, but she not very interested in supporting, encouraging, or offering advice to women generally or to younger women who may be wondering about a career in science. Her sole focus is on promoting herself, and I guess I have to wonder if her approach isn’t the smartest given the current conditions. But had I met her earlier on or worked for her type when I was young, I think I would never have pursued academic science. The reason I pursued it at all is mostly due to the positive experience I had working together with the men and women in my second job who were professional, respectful of others, and supportive.
So what are the problems with choosing a career in science these days if you are a woman? Most scientific fields are male-dominated. While that doesn’t have to be a problem, it often is because men tend to network with other men in order to help them get ahead. In the twenty years I’ve been here in Norway , that is the rule, not the exception. Additionally women don’t often attempt to network with other women, so women (especially younger scientists) lose out. Some men I know have turned out to be snakes in the grass—they talk a good game (that they support you) but don’t really do so in practice. They ‘forget’ to mention your name when they could, or they work against you by questioning your qualifications even after you’ve proven that you are qualified for a position or status (professor competence, for example). But they do this too to some of the men I know as well. I miss camaraderie with other scientists, be they men or women, but more women wouldn’t hurt. Academic science is for the most part a lonely profession. I have a collaborator in Italy (a woman about my age) who has the same problems I have, getting new students, little funding and a tiny network of collaborators. We stick together, share our joys and woes, and try to come up with decent projects that we can work on together in order to keep our collaboration viable. She is a nice woman and a smart one—a good combination for the younger people in her research institute to see and to look up to. You might want to choose academic science as a career if you met her. She is a good role model, but she is more the exception than the rule, unfortunately. And she, like me, is honest with the younger generation, women especially. It’s difficult to make it in academic science these days whether you are a man or a woman. So if I was younger, I would probably choose another way to use my love of science, perhaps science journalism or working as an editor for a scientific journal. I know I could have been satisfied in those careers as I have been up to this point in academic science. It remains to be seen what the future has in store for those of us who see the major changes, can do little about them, and who wonder where it all will end.
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Out In The Country by Three Dog Night
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