Rutgers Office for Research Honors Women's History Month

Shawna Hudson, PhD
Professor, Research Division Chief and Henry Rutgers Chair of Family Medicine and Community Health
Director, Center Advancing Research and Evaluation for Patient-Centered Care (CARE-PC)
Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
RBHS

What is the focus of your research and its potential impact?
I am a medical sociologist by training and work as a community-engaged primary care researcher. My studies focus on developing and implementing interventions to improve care for vulnerable populations. I use my sociology training in qualitative and survey research methods to do implementation science research focused on understanding how community and health care contexts impact patient experience, clinician experience and patient outcomes. I recently completed a $5 million COVID-19 study to increase outreach, awareness, and uptake of testing in Black and Latino populations in New Jersey and contributed to the 2021 National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine report focused on how to implement high quality primary care. I am currently funded by the National Cancer Institute to look at how to improve implementation of breast cancer survivorship follow-up care in primary care settings. The goal of all of my research is to help create better and more navigable systems of care.

What and/or who inspired you to focus on this particular area of research, and what and/or who inspires you now?     
When I was completing my dissertation, my advisor received a breast cancer diagnosis. As Rutgers faculty she had fantastic resources and access to care and was able to survive many years afterwards; however, she spent a lot of time managing illnesses and conditions that impacted her quality of life as a result of the cancer and its treatment. In my family there is also a strong history of cancer, and I noticed some striking differences in the experiences of my advisor and those of my family members with similar diagnoses. Understanding how to make changes to make the system work for everyone is how I got into this. Now many years later it's the people that I talk with in my studies who continue to inspire me. At the end of the day, reducing disparities in care really drives my research and I focus on helping health systems develop processes to do better for the patients and the communities that they serve.

What has your experience been like as a woman working in your field of research?
While medicine is a largely white, male dominated field, I'm fortunate to work in subfields (behavioral health, cancer survivorship, primary care, health equity) where I have met strong inspirational women leaders as well. When I first began there were fewer women, but I'm encouraged by the shifts in academic medicine to identify, engage, and retain a more diverse workforce.

How would you advise any student who wishes to pursue a career in your field of research?
Be curious! Reach out to faculty and others around you and ask about their “origin stories” and pathways to their current careers. Many of us are open and willing to share our thoughts and experiences.

What more could be done to improve the diversity, inclusion, and equality within your field of research?
We need to be creative about how we reach out to the next generation. We can't just rely on existing professional networks at the graduate school level to develop new talent. We need to think about how we network with students early in the pathway to get them energized about the possibilities. Our institutions need to develop ways to facilitate long term relationships through programs at the high school and undergraduate levels to spark interest and expose people to possibilities. We also need to make sure there are programs in place to help address structural barriers within our settings.

How can the academic sector enhance and improve opportunities and the working environment for researchers like you? 
That's an interesting question. I think openness to examining the current context of what shapes what we value as academic output and expression should be explored. Many of the academic outcomes that we reward measure academic busyness (e.g., #s of papers, books, grants, presentations). However, I’m not sure how well these measures correlate with our scholarly impact. In addition to those measures, we also need to take into account impact and translation of our work into outcomes that make the communities and settings that we work in better as well. I think that highlighting measures of this type of impact will help to attract more people like me who want their research to change the world into the academic sector.

Renata Pasqualini, PhD
Chief, Division of Cancer Biology
Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey
RBHS

What is the focus of your research and its potential impact?
The overarching framework that forms the basis of our research and translational efforts is the discovery of probes (peptides and antibodies) that can be used for targeted delivery in a more precise way. The potential impact is the development of therapies that are less toxic and more effective.

We focus on cancer and obesity, however, we also explore several other systems that are in play in any organ or tissue in the human body.

What and/or who inspired you to focus on this particular area of research, and what and/or who inspires you now?
We invented, perfected, and established a unique way to find unique zip codes in human blood vessels, and over several years we continued to build a map/GPS system for human tissues (normal and diseased). The ability to do research that is creative, based on our own ideas, and potentially help patients someday, is what inspires me.

The broad applicability of this technology and our early success in extensive pre-clinical and preliminary clinical studies is also very rewarding.

What has your experience been like as a woman working in your field of research?
Any significant progress, particularly in oncology, is very difficult to achieve. Original ideas are met with staggering resistance. There are too many people doing too many things, and funding is tight – from any source – state, federal, private of public organization. Women often have to do it all – at work and at home. It takes a great deal of focus, prioritization skills, and energy. It is not only the 24/7 grind, but the intensity of the work that is required. It takes incredible devotion and often difficult choices must be made.

How would you advise any student who wishes to pursue a career in your field of research?
If you are not obsessed with purpose, and with the notion of doing something that could help a lot of people someday – a contribution that will be around long after you are gone – do not bother. If making money is the goal, do not even consider.

Academia is not what it used to be. There is no time to spare or contemplate. It is hard, there is a lot of senseless rejection, there are papers, grants, biotech funding, and it is not glamorous. Most people fail. And not because of the quality of their science. Important work and expertise gained can be completely invisible in the field of drug development. And the bar is always higher and higher. Invent a drug, develop it, fund it, evaluate it, approve it – it takes years. Meanwhile, many will complain that it takes too long and costs too much. However, the best scientists have the tendency to doubt and the capacity to believe in equal measure. This is the key.

What more could be done to improve the diversity, inclusion, and equality within your field of research?
Every person has something unique to contribute to research and they deserve a chance that cannot be earned without an opportunity, ever so small as it might be, to show it. We are all links on a chain that started long ago.

How can the academic sector enhance and improve opportunities and the working environment for researchers like you?
I am – reluctantly – going to adapt JFK's quote...“ask not what others can do for you, ask what you can do towards advancing science.” Nonetheless, when people with resources and power can recognize talent, creativity, innovation, skill, and perseverance, the world will be a better place. It can happen from time to time. It needs to happen more often, everywhere.

Grace Brannigan, PhD
Director of the Center for Computational and Integrative Biology
Associate Professor of Physics
Rutgers Camden

What is the focus of your research and its potential impact?
My research aims to understand how biological molecules and structures (like proteins, membranes, DNA, cholesterol, or hormones) interact with each other to cause disease - and how interactions with drugs and drug delivery systems can treat disease. Understanding these interactions allows us to understand the "rules of engagement" so that treatments may be designed in a more strategic way. We primarily use tools from computational biophysics, which allow us to use the laws of physics to fill in missing pieces of information that experiments cannot access. 

What and/or who inspired you to focus on this particular area of research, and what and/or who inspires you now?
School! I really liked every physics class I took, even the unit on simple machines that we did when I was in elementary school. The science seemed so orderly and powerful! Physicists really value consistency and being able to make predictions about the future. 

Then, when I was a teenager, I started taking antidepressants and I learned that although they are widely prescribed, we don’t know how they work. I found that pretty alarming, as well as personally frustrating. I felt that if we had a better understanding of how they work, it would be easier to predict which antidepressants would work best for different people. In my classes, I had learned that physics had a very powerful approach for making predictions, and I didn’t understand why such an important question wasn’t a big focus for physicists, many of whom took antidepressants themselves!

These days, I am inspired by the many physicists since the 19th century who have played vital roles in untangling molecular biology. For instance, it was Einstein who demonstrated conclusively that "everyday" matter is made up of molecules. This discovery may not have been as mathematically sophisticated as his theories of relativity, but it was highly interdisciplinary and has impacted a much broader range of scientific fields. In fact, his most cited work is not on relativity, but on the viscosity of suspensions! Many of his contemporaries also developed physics-based theories of biomolecules, successfully predicting the structures that are now central to our understanding of molecular biology!

What has your experience been like as a woman working in your field of research?
I have never been a man working in my field, so I cannot say for sure how many of the negative (or positive!) experiences are related to my gender. However, I think my experience was pretty common to many ambitious women who encounter sexism in the workplace.

I started out young and idealistic, convinced that sexism was a thing of the past and the world wanted me to succeed. I worked hard, and when I failed, I always blamed myself; if the failure was my fault, that meant the solution was within my grasp. Like many women in research settings, I also experienced sexual violence, but first I blamed myself, and then I attributed it to an accident of wrong-place, wrong-time, wrong-person. Most ambitious people prefer to have as much control over their career as possible, so it is much easier to take responsibility than to accept inherent limitations. 

As my career progressed, I started to gradually notice that my male peers were being treated as more senior than me. It didn’t happen every time - but it was never the reverse. They would receive enthusiastic mentorship on large opportunities, and I would receive lukewarm mentorship on small opportunities. Greats in the field would perpetually insist on discussing my work with my male collaborators, postdocs, or students, instead of me. I always had an innocent explanation for this, and some of the time I am sure my explanation was right!

Yet I then began noticing particularly egregious incidents involving different female colleagues in which my colleague’s work, dignity, or competence was inexplicably discounted or dismissed. Watching from the sidelines, I could see what was happening more clearly. The role of sexism in constraining my whole professional career came into focus. It was not just something that happened in the past, or to other women. Yet it had certainly happened to many other women, and there weren’t as many of us left. I grieved all the missing female colleagues who left the lab permanently because they could not reach a work environment where they felt safe.

After all that, I needed a way to push my research goals forward anyway. I am a scientist, trained to circumvent and overcome natural obstacles in clever and surprising ways, so I found one. 

In short, I had fewer possible paths to the same goal, and I didn't even start to realize that until I was at least 30 years old, and before that time I ended up in some pretty dark places. Yet at this point I do genuinely like the path I found, and I think that I have an opportunity to clear more paths for more junior scientists from a range of backgrounds. I hope that I have already started!

How would you advise any student who wishes to pursue a career in your field of research?
Don't be afraid of physics classes! You don't have to be the best in the class, you just have to take them. 

What more could be done to improve the diversity, inclusion, and equality within your field of research?
In my opinion, the single most important step that physics could take to improve long-term participation of women is to dramatically reduce incidents of sexual harassment. It is possible that we still wouldn't have gender parity after, say, 20 years of a low-harassment research culture, but isn't the experiment worth a try anyway?

On a different topic, the general public is confused about who does science, which can be very misleading for aspiring young scientists who haven't yet been fully integrated into the field. Most people get their ideas of who does science from television and movies, and for decades, movie-scientists fell into two categories, which I'll call Christopher Lloyd (Einstein-like disheveled white hair) or John Malkovich (well-groomed with gravitas). As a girl, this was confusing to me because the main scientist I knew was my mother, who didn't look like either of these men. Later on, people would tell me I didn't look like a physicist, and I was always baffled because I spent much more time around physicists than they did, and I felt that I did look like a physicist!

Sometimes I would even lie about my major, just to avoid this reaction. Then I learned that they were getting their ideas of what I "should" look like from television, and I realized that I was educating them by providing them with an example of a "real" physicist. Since the explosion of more independent content, many representations of scientists have moved away from these cartoonish depictions. I am excited to see whether this has an impact on the public perception of "who does science" 10 years from now!

How can the academic sector enhance and improve opportunities and the working environment for researchers like you?
I participated in a year-long leadership workshop for tenured female faculty in STEM, which Rutgers hosted. It was fantastic. Even many of the participants who were skeptical at the beginning were surprised to find that it was extremely valuable. I would really like to see this opportunity made available at multiple levels. I was just beginning as the graduate program director for our interdisciplinary center (Center for Computational and Integrative Biology) when I took it, and I directly credit it with the growth in the graduate program. I am now director of that same center, and I am relying on different lessons that I learned in that same workshop. 

Fei Zhang, PhD
Assistant Professor, Chemistry
Principal Investigator, Biomolecular Design Lab
Rutgers Newark

What is the focus of your research and its potential impact?
My current research focuses on using nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) as programmable building blocks for creating biological materials and nanodevices. By exploiting Watson-Crick base pairings and other interactions in DNA and RNA, we can design and assemble nucleic acid strands into desired shapes with controlled functions. For example, we create 2D and 3D nanostructures that can also move and change conformations in response to external stimuli. We also explore hybrid materials by interfacing DNA with other organic and inorganic materials to pursue various functionalities. This research topic has broad applications in biomaterials, nanofabrication, biosensing, bioimaging, and therapeutics.

What and/or who inspired you to focus on this particular area of research, and what and/or who inspires you now?
When I was a graduate student, I was so fascinated by the idea of using DNA molecules as nanoscale ‘LEGO’ pieces to build things. This idea was initially proposed by Dr. Nadrian Seeman in the 1980s when he was trying to crystallize proteins. He reasoned that producing well-oriented protein crystals would benefit from the usage of a three-dimensional nanoscale lattice made from DNA. This proposal, which was first published in 1982, served as the impetus for this area of study. The invention of DNA origami technology in 2006 is one of the significant turning points in our area. This research area has really expanded quickly over the last ten years, and there are currently hundreds of research groups working in it. It is an exciting research topic and never ceases to amaze me.

What has your experience been like as a woman working in your field of research?
Our research field is highly interdisciplinary, and researchers come from a range of disciplines including chemistry, physics, biology, engineering, computer science, and mathematics. There is a great community of brilliant, encouraging individuals working in this field of research. Some outstanding female researchers are my role models. Knowing them makes me feel fortunate. But at several of the conferences I've attended, I've seen that there are far fewer female researchers than male researchers. It is like a small group of people entering a different world. It is a welcoming world, but I do sense pressure. I feel I have pressure to prove myself and must work very hard to establish my credibility. Still, I’m very grateful to have all the support and help from our scientific community. It is an excellent one.

How would you advise any student who wishes to pursue a career in your field of research?
Opportunities and resources are essential for students to grow into qualified researchers. To provide various opportunities, we have various outreach programs and training opportunities for different levels of students. We host summer internships for high school students through ACS Project SEED programs. We also routinely recruit undergraduate students through the Rutgers-led NSF Garden State LSAMP program (Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation) aiming at increasing the number of professionals from minority groups that are traditionally underrepresented in STEM fields. For resources, our group established an excellent environment for learning and collaboration. We have a set of training designed for new graduate students who just start their research. We set five-year goals, annual plans, and detailed semester plans to help individuals to succeed. To become an independent researcher, in addition to passion, talent, and hard work, you need years of training to equip yourself with knowledge and vision to be able to identify the gaps, challenges, and opportunities, and to fill the gap and solve the problems using your knowledge. It is not an easy path, but it is a worthy one.

What more could be done to improve the diversity, inclusion, and equality within your field of research?

• Provide more opportunities: workshops, symposiums, and conferences need to be more inclusive to allow more people to learn and communicate. Under-represented groups should be encouraged and offered greater exposure to these opportunities.
• Build practical support: Support is needed to make sure the research programs are inclusive. Student travel awards, registration reductions, and other supports are helpful ways to encourage broader participation.
• Establish mentorship programs: early career researchers can benefit from mentorship a lot. Different types of mentoring can be done, from cross-lab training to lunch with established professors.

How can the academic sector enhance and improve opportunities and the working environment for researchers like you?
Giving young faculty members the resources and chances is the greatest approach to support them. Rutgers has excellent programs to support early career scholars. From 2021 to 2022, I have been participating in the Rutgers Program of Early Career Excellence (PECE). It offers a one-on-one mentorship program in addition to a number of classes. My time spent with my PECE mentor was wonderful. This is an excellent opportunity for early career faculties. During the program, I have meetings with my mentor every two months. The mentor was assigned as someone who understands the mentee’s research but comes from another department. Thus, there's no need to be concerned about future disputes or creating a negative impression by discussing difficulties. The mentor offered me advice and suggestions, for which I am really grateful. Similar programs for different levels of faculty members will be highly appreciated.

Valerie Tutwiler, PhD
Assistant Professor, Biomedical Engineering
Rutgers School of Engineering
Rutgers New Brunswick

What is the focus of your research and its potential impact?
My research focuses on how blood clots work. Fundamentally, this is important because excessive blood clotting causes serious health conditions such as ischemic strokes, heart attacks, and venous thromboembolism. These cardiovascular conditions round the top of the list of death and disability worldwide. Conversely, if blood clotting is impaired this can lead to excessive bleeding. Traumatic injury, and in particular excessive bleeding following injury, is the leading cause of death in people under the age of 45 both at home and in extreme situations such as on the battlefield. Understanding a blood clot’s structure and mechanics is critical in those situations. In particular, we aim to use this fundamental knowledge to inform patient care through several clinical collaborations with an eye towards developing novel therapeutics and diagnostic tools.

What and/or who inspired you to focus on this particular area of research, and what and/or who inspires you now?
My grandfather passed away from an ischemic stroke when I was a child and my grandmother from a heart attack when I was in college. At the time I remember being struck by the gaps in knowledge when I asked the doctors questions, and the limited treatment approaches available. As a child I was always inquisitive and loved solving puzzles and finding solutions to problems. This experience with my grandfather spurred me on towards finding a way towards researching strokes and blood clots.  When I started at Drexel University, I was given the opportunity to participate in the STAR undergraduate research program, which provided me the fundamentals needed to pursue a research-based career.  When applying for co-op positions later that year, the position at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia gave me the opportunity to conduct research on blood clots and maybe begin to answer some of those questions that could help to save future grandparents and adults suffering from heart attacks and strokes. As a biomedical engineer, I work to not only understand the underlying pathology of diseases but to develop new tools to help us better diagnose and treat patients. Now, I am inspired by the passion for science and commitment to excellence that I see in the eyes of my students because it mirrors my own passion for this exciting field. My husband and my family continue to be a source of inspiration and support.

What has your experience been like as a woman working in your field of research?
As an engineer, I have become used to working in a male dominated field. However, I have been exceptionally fortunate to have a number of excellent mentors who encouraged and supported me throughout my training and still do now. I am inspired by the number of female students I see pursuing careers in engineering and thrilled that I currently have four female PhD students in my lab. I have always been and will continue to be a strong advocate for women in STEM. From the time that I joined the Rutgers BME community, I knew that I found the perfect home. My colleagues provide endless support, guidance, and friendship. Through my role as a Provost Research Leadership Fellow in the RU-NB Chancellor-Provost office I am constantly encouraged by the number of women in academic leadership positions that I interact with, and I value their continued mentorship.

How would you advise any student who wishes to pursue a career in your field of research?
I encourage students to get involved in research early on in their education. For me, the hands-on experiences with research were invaluable at shaping my education and career trajectory. I am a strong advocate for experiential learning and actively participate in several training programs that are geared at earlier access to research experience.

What more could be done to improve the diversity, inclusion, and equality within your field of research?
One of the best ways to improve diversity, inclusion, and equality within the sciences and engineering is to create an environment that is welcoming across career levels, genders, ethnicity, etc; one where there is equality of opportunities. I strive to create a laboratory and classroom environment that makes all students feel comfortable by welcoming diverse viewpoints. I think by broadening engagement and demonstrating an inclusive environment to students at an earlier stage in their education we can strive to promote people from diverse background engaging in STEM careers. For example, I actively give lessons to local elementary and high school aged students about the various science topics and careers. I am passionate about making the field of biomedical engineering accessible and in promoting diversity. I hope that my peers strive to the same.

How can the academic sector enhance and improve opportunities and the working environment for researchers like you?
Rutgers has been an amazingly supportive community, in large part because they value the beloved community and providing opportunities to faculty and students. I am very grateful for opportunities to participate in a variety of mentoring and academic leadership programs on campus, as I know these opportunities will enhance my career prospective as I plan for future leadership roles in academia.  As a result, I actively encourage my students to seek out and apply to many such opportunities. Within Biomedical Engineering, as undergraduates there is an ~50/50 split for male and female students. As we progress further in our careers the percentage of women decreases rapidly. The opportunities for women in STEM within the academic sector would be enhanced by the increased opportunities for grant funding for trainees. Often, these prestigious fellowships do not allow for international students to apply and are based on prior publication/funding track record. This can limit the opportunities for women in STEM as we are often challenged to find an optimum work-life balance. Increasing the number of opportunities for funding, access to childcare, and resources for successfully pursuing these opportunities would benefit all but especially women.