A recent Science article, posted in the Science Careers section, reported that representatives from the UC postdoc union testified recently at a hearing of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and Labor. Ludmila Tyler, a UC postdoc, led the charge in letting the lawmakers understand the plight of UC postdocs. Representative George Miller (D-CA), who chaired the hearing, was notably moved by Dr. Tyler’s testimony. From the article:

Tyler’s brave and poignant description of the low pay, insecurity, chancy benefits, difficulty securing maternity leave, and general discouragement that many postdocs endure was effective. “I have colleagues who say, ‘Why don’t I quit science and work at Home Depot? I hear they’re a pretty good employer,’ ” she told the congressional representatives. “And the sad thing is, they’re only half joking.” The members of Congress seemed surprised and, according to Miller, “deeply concerned” and “disappointed” by this and other testimony — which indicates how effectively the viewpoints of the research universities and today’s established scientists have dominated the discussion and how little attention tomorrow’s scientists’ concerns have received.

Apparently, the postdocs made a strong impression upon the politicians and may have rallied some sympathy for their cause:

The lawmakers, two of them UC alumni, all expressed chagrin. Miller in particular seemed flummoxed by Tyler’s presentation. He mentioned briefly that what she revealed appeared to contradict the widely assumed scientist shortage. “It’s almost as if we’re toying with some of the brightest, most talented, and skilled people in our society,” he mused in dismay. “This raises serious questions about the underlying … policies. … If we are going to subsidize the acceleration of America’s excellence and talents on the back of these very talented individuals, something is very upside down in the university community, very upside down. … The policy question around the use and abuse of these grants is a larger issue for the Congress.”

The writer of the article, Beryl Lieff Benderly, analyzes the situation beautifully and asks some hard-hitting questions as she writes:

Even more fundamental than the passage of a particular bill is the question of what, exactly, the “deeply concerned” Miller and his colleagues understand to be the policy problems involved in universities’ treatment of postdocs. The lawmakers’ statements at the Berkeley hearing make clear that they could use a good deal more education about the realities of life in the nation’s university labs. Was Miller troubled by specific transgressions of particular employers or by the deep and pervasive dysfunctional nature of the “pyramid” system of academic research, which depends on the systematic exploitation of cheap graduate student and postdoc labor? Solving the first problem would be straightforward, but solving the second would require a fundamental reform of the system and dislocations in practices that are dear to powerful interest groups.

Every year, Chemical and Engineering News tallies the numbers of female faculty in chemistry at the top 50 universities in the US. This year, that tally shows that women now make up 17%  of the faculty, which is up one percent from last year. For comparison’s sake, women make up about 35% of PhD chemists and therefore are grossly underrepresented in the hallowed halls of academe.

A lot of pomp and circumstance has been made in an apparent effort to increase the number of women faculty, but the increase in numbers is still occurring at a glacial pace. Some have criticized these efforts as being simply superficial and therefore not resulting in the dramatic impact they claim to support.

A lot of people still ask the ridiculous question of why we should even care about how many women make up the faculty in academe. For those people, here are the top five reasons:

1. Professors in the top 50 universities garner the majority of the government resources allocated to performing scientific research. It is in our national interest that these resources be allocated to the best and brightest researchers in the country. Because it has been shown time and time again that men and women have equal intellectual potential, then any selected group of the top talent should not be over-represented by one gender. Statistically, if men are over-represented then we have passed over a brilliant woman in favor of hiring a mediocre man. So, monitoring gender equity is an important way to ensure we are getting the best of the best.

2. Numerous studies have shown that systemic gender bias exists in chemistry hiring and promotion processes. Hiring more women and promoting them to positions of power helps to stop gender bias.

3. Research funding is paid for by taxpayers. Taxpayers should not fund a system in which systemic gender bias exists.

4. Numerous studies have  shown that students need mentors that look like them in order to feel that they will be successful in a given field. So, in order for a young, black man to think about a career in chemistry, it is important that all of his teachers not be white men. Likewise, in order for a young woman to think about a career in chemistry, it is important that all of her teachers not be men. The first priority of an institution of higher learning is to develop the leaders and thinkers of tomorrow. This requires that an institution provide mentors to its students. Most chemistry departments fail miserably with this, and thus the perpetuation of a white male dominated field continues. It is not because white men just happen to be better than everyone else, it is because the system is inherently exclusive.

5. Women want to be research chemistry professors at the top 50 universities and it is unethical to prevent them that chance due to gender bias. Women want to gain access to power and command resources. The myth that most women don’t want to be professors is just that, a myth.

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Section 6301 of the bill establishes an independent, not-for-profit corporation, the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)

“to assist patients, clinicians, purchasers, and policy-makers in making informed health decisions by advancing the quality and relevance of evidence concerning the manner in which diseases, disorders, and other health conditions can effectively and appropriately be prevented, diagnosed, treated, monitored, and managed through research and evidence synthesis that considers variations in patient subpopulations, and the dissemination of research findings with respect to the relative health outcomes, clinical effectiveness, and appropriateness of the medical treatments, services, … “

In other words, the institute will conduct research to find out which drugs are the most effective at treating a particular disease. This could be extremely useful because several recent studies have shown that the newest and most expensive drugs are not always the best treatment. For example, one study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that water pills were better at treating hypertension than ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers, which cost 30 times more than a simple water pill. However, since drug companies have short-lived patents on their products, they have a huge financial incentive to make new drugs, that can be patent-protected, to replace those old ones. In order to get FDA approval for a new drug, companies have to prove a laundry list of things, including effectiveness and safety, but not that their new drug is better than drugs developed several decades ago. They simply have to show their drug is better than a placebo.

Since there is no financial incentive for a pharmaceutical company to conduct such comparative research between their new products and older ones, these studies are not typically conducted by the drug industry. However, such research, if truly done objectively and scientifically on a large scale, could have a huge impact on healthcare costs. It could keep the drug companies from wasting resources on drugs that aren’t any better than what is already available.

In academia, the question everyone has to answer about their chemistry research is: “How is your method of doing X better than the methods already out there?” It isn’t enough to just be doing something different and new, it has to be better. How often academic research lives up to that standard is debatable, but still the question is important to ask of all scientific research. Just because Pfizer can develop a new drug to treat cholesterol doesn’t mean they should. It is only truly a valuable scientific contribution if the new drug is better than those already on the market.

Overall, we think the creation of a comparative research center could potentially lower healthcare costs. We think it could help promote better drug discovery by essentially creating a peer-review process for new drugs and therapies. Also, we imagine that this center will create many new jobs for scientists, which is good news for all of those out-of-work or underemployed chemists out there.

Interestingly, the U.K. already has a center similar to this called the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE). We imagine that is where Obama got the idea for the center in the first place.

Photo source: slideworld.com

According to an article in the WSJ:

Cargo theft in the pharmaceutical sector is on the rise. Last year, there were 46 drug thefts valued at a total of $184 million, up from 35 thefts of about $41 million in 2007, according to Dan Burges, director of intelligence at the U.S. division of FreightWatch International, a supply-chain security consultant. There have been 10 pharmaceutical thefts valued at a total of $110 million this year, he said. These values represent manufacturing, packaging and shipping costs

In the midst of economic struggle within the pharmaceutical sector, this theft delivers a serious blow to Eli Lilly’s bottom line. We imagine that other pharmaceutical companies will take notice  of this incident and beef up security at their facilities.

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According to ETH-Zurich, this award was given to Professor Stubbe for her work on understanding how ribonucleotide reductases (RNRs) work. An explanation of her research by ETH-Zurich is described here:

RNRs are enzymes that convert ribonucleotides into deoxyribonucleotides, the building blocks of DNA.  Through meticulously designed experiments, Professor Stubbe established a unifying mechanism for ribonucleotide reductases in which a protein-based thiyl radical abstracts a hydrogen atom from the ribonucleotide 3’-position, initiating formation of nucleotide radicals that are ultimately reduced by a pair of cysteine thiols at the enzyme active site. In addition to revealing the utility of radicals for achieving otherwise difficult chemical transformations, this work has contributed directly to the development of drugs such as gemcitabine for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. Similarly, Professor Stubbe unraveled the mechanism by which the antitumor antibiotic bleomycin exploits Fe2+ and O2 to mediate double stranded DNA cleavage. Further research interests include enzymes involved in purine biosynthesis, pathways for assembling iron-based cofactors, and the mechanism of polymerases that produce biodegradable polyester polymers. This broad scientific program has yielded more than 250 publications. It reflects boundless curiosity, extraordinary experimental prowess, and an indefatigable drive to produce outstanding science.

In addition to the PreLog medal, Professor Stubbe also recently received the National Medal of Science, another extremely selective honor given by the National Science Foundation. Go here to read more about Professor Stubbe’s exciting resesarch!

Photo source: http://web.mit.edu/biochemistry/people.htm

Now the drug is in Phase III clinical trials and the medical and scientific communities have had high hopes for its success. Unfortunately, the results of two of the Phase III clinical trials for Dimebon were released last week and are quite disappointing. The studies indicate that Dimebon was hardly better than a placebo in treating Alzheimer’s disease. These findings represent a radical departure from the results of the previous clincial trial performed by Medivation.

Right now, the lead researchers of the trial are scratching their heads and trying to reconcile these radically different results. Additional clinical trials are ongoing and the results from those will hopefully shed light on this conundrum.

In the meantime, we imagine that Pfizer is feeling like it jumped the gun on investing in this particular drug candidate, especially since none of the researchers could offer a plausible, biochemical rationale for how an antihistamine was treating a neurodegenerative disease.

Photo Source: http://www.chm.bris.ac.uk

Postdoctoral researchers contribute heavily to academic publications and are critical to the advancement of science in the US. According to a press release by the UAW:

Postdocs play a critical role in the University’s world-renowned research operations: performing complex research in diverse fields, ranging from AIDS and cancer research to developing improved technologies and addressing climate change; publishing scholarly articles; and writing grant proposals.  All of this work helps bring more than three billion dollars in grants and contracts to the 10 UC campuses each year.  The vast majority of this money comes from federal sources such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation (NSF), whose budgets have increased recently as part of the Obama administration’s efforts to reprioritize federal funding of scientific research for its own sake as well as to stimulate economic growth.

A recent survey found that Postdocs were the primary author on 43% of the articles in Science magazine, the premiere research journal in the world.

Despite their critical importance to the academic machine, postdoctoral researchers have not been granted many of the basic benefits that most other employees at universities enjoy. As a result of these disparate benefits, postdocs in California unionized a few years ago, joining the PRO/UAW union, which now represents over 5,000 postdocs working for UC schools. Negotiations between UC and the PRO/UAW have been ongoing since December of 2008, but right now it looks like negotiations have stalled over wages, as UC President Mark Yudof doesn’t want to budge on this issue. Here are some of the benefits the postdocs are seeking:

1. paid leaves of absence for the following: maternity and paternity leave, sick leave, child care, bereavement, and disability

2. Guaranteed worker’s compensation

3. Health insurance on par with other UC employees

4. Cost-of-living adjustments in wages and wages commensurate with level of experience and education

5. Workload protections (for example, postdocs are often required to work 70 to 80 hours per week)

6. Access to childcare

7. Adequate protections against all forms of discrimination, including sexual harassment and discrimination based upon pregnancy, sexual orientation, and gender

8. Fair grievance procedures

9. Safe working environment

10. Intellectual property rights regarding their IP contributions

We think it is absurd that postdocs have had to unionize in order to get the fair treatment they certainly deserve. These are the best and brightest people in America, and yet they receive far fewer benefits than a Starbucks barista. In fact, when one considers the average number of hours worked per week, the majority of these postdocs are not even making minimum wage. We don’t know who would want to pursue a scientific career these days when faced with this kind of dismal future. And considering that in this economy it is virtually impossible to get a job without postdoctoral experience, this issue should hit home with all current and future scientists.

It is also obvious how guaranteeing maternity and paternity leave, along with access to childcare, would be critical to retaining women in science. Numerous studies have shown that women leave scientific research during the postdoctoral stage. Could the lack of benefits at the postdoc stage be causing women to leave science? Since most female postdocs are in their late twenties to early thirties, it becomes a critical issue for them as to whether they will be able to have babies when doing a postdoc.

By not guaranteeing these benefits, we are telling our brightest American women that they cannot have children if they want to excel in science. That is just ridiculous and harmful to our national interest. After we have committed 10 plus years of education and funding to the development of these scientists, we  shouldn’t let it all go to waste because of inadequate benefits during the postdoctoral research appointment.

We support the PRO/UAW in their negotiations and wish them the best of luck!

Photo source: http://www.prouaw.org/home/home.php

Alice Ting is a professor of chemistry at MIT where her research lab focuses on labeling proteins in order to understand cell signaling. Ting was given the Arthur C. Cope Scholar award in recognition of her use of lipoic acid ligase to attach biophysical probes to proteins with excellent site specificity, for use in live cell imaging.

In her own words, Dr. Ting explains her research as follows:

Our lab develops new methodology for studying protein, RNA, and small-molecule function in the live cell context. Whereas traditional biochemistry studies biomolecules in purified form in vitro, we seek to understand them in their native context, namely the complex environment of the cell surface and cell interior. To achieve this, our lab develops non-invasive methodologies and “reporters” for reading out information about specific biomolecules and biochemical events from single living cells.

Helen Blackwell, who incidentally has one of the best academic research websites we have seen, is a professor at the University of Wisconsin. In her own words, Dr. Blackwell’s research group focuses on the following:

We are strategically combining elements of microwave-assisted organic chemistry, solid-phase synthesis, and combinatorial chemistry to provide access to new classes of chemical probes. In turn, we are applying these small molecule tools to bacterial communication and host/microbe interactions, previously unexamined areas of chemical biology. We seek to understand how both plants and animals sense and respond to invasion by pathogenic microbes. The ability of bacteria to communicate with each other and function as a group is a critical step in the development of infectious disease. The reliance of bacteria on a language of small molecules places organic chemists in a unique position to discover the fundamental principles underlying this communication network and design tools to modulate it at the molecular level.

Blackwell was given the Arthur C. Cope Scholar award in recognition of her work on understanding bacterial communication via the development of small molecules that modulate the key protein-protein interactions that make up bacterial communication pathways. By altering these communication pathways, she could potentially develop therapeutics to treat agricultural and human infectious diseases. Fascinating stuff!!

M. Christina White is a professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and no stranger to awards. In fact, she has really become a superstar in the field of organic synthesis within the past few years. In her own words, Dr. White’s research group focuses on the following:

My laboratory has initiated a program to develop highly selective oxidation methods, similar to those found in Nature, for the direct installation of oxygen, nitrogen and carbon functionalities into allylic and aliphatic C-H bonds of complex molecules and their intermediates. Unlike Nature which uses elaborate enzyme active sites, we rely on the subtle electronic and steric interactions between C-H bonds and small molecule transition metal complexes to achieve high selectivities. Using these methods, my group aims to develop novel strategies for streamlining the process of complex molecule synthesis. Collectively, we aim to change the way that complex molecules are constructed by redefining the reactivity principles of C-H bonds in complex molecule settings.

White was given the Archur C. Cope Scholar award in recognition of her large and impressive body of work in the area of C-H oxidation. Her work will undoubtedly have a dramatic impact upon the drug industry, with applications to the synthesis of drugs. By the way, she is also a fantastic speaker, so if you ever get a chance to hear her lecture about her research, don’t pass up the opportunity!

A recent study done by researchers at the University of Chicago has found that female elementary school teachers who have math anxiety seem to transfer that anxiety to their female students, negatively affecting those students’ performance in math. According to an interview with the lead author on the study by ScienceDaily:

“Having a highly math-anxious female teacher may push girls to confirm the stereotype that they are not as good as boys at math, which in turn, affects girls’ math achievement,” said Sian Beilock, Associate Professor in Psychology and the Committee on Education at the University of Chicago, lead author of a paper, “Female Teachers’ Math Anxiety Affects Girls’ Math Achievement” published in the January 11 issue of theProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Beilock is an expert on anxiety and stress as they relate to learning and performance.

When one considers that 90% of all elementary school teachers are female and that those teachers are given very little math training, it is easy to see how this negative effect could be having huge consequences for American girls. This effect was further discussed in ScienceDaily’s interview with the lead author of the study, Sian Beilock:

Other research has shown that elementary school children are highly influenced by the attitudes of adults and that this relationship is strongest for students and adults of the same gender. “Thus it may be that first- and second-grade girls are more likely to be influenced by their teachers’ anxieties than their male classmates, because most early elementary school teachers are female and the high levels of math anxiety in this teacher population confirm a societal stereotype about girls’ math ability,” Beilock said.

In addition, the study showed that simply believing the stereotype that boys are better at math than girls has a dramatic and negative impact upon performance. Specifically, the study found that girls who believed this stereotype did markedly worse in math achievement than girls who did not. Boys’ performance was not affected.

In addition to this study, previous research done by Dr. Matthew McGlone at the University of Texas at Austin had found that standardized test scores were influenced by gender identity questions asked immediately prior to the exam. Dr. McGlone discussed his findings in a UT interview, an excerpt of which is found here:

Survey researchers have known for years that identity issues influence the way people answer opinion questions, especially in the context of political research. Women respond differently in political opinion surveys depending on the gender of the survey administrator, with a tendency to report more liberal attitudes when asked by a woman.

“What’s surprising is that identity issues can come into play into what is ostensibly a test of your knowledge,” said McGlone. “Heightened awareness about your identity as a man or woman or member of a certain group could influence your performance on a standardized math test.”

This phenomenon is called stereotype threat—the fear that one’s behavior will confirm an existing stereotype of a group with which that person identifies, leading to impaired performance. It was first articulated by Aronson and social psychologist Claude Steele of Stanford University.

“Stereotype threat can be induced by a variety of subtle cues in the testing environment,” McGlone said, “such as the gender composition of a class or being asked to indicate one’s ethnicity or gender on a test demographics question. These cues heightened awareness of people’s ‘ascribed identities’—for example, identities based on things about themselves that they can’t easily change.”

McGlone acknowledged that many aspects of personal identity are achieved—membership in social categories based on individual achievements—rather than ascribed. He contended that deficits in test performance caused by stereotype threat could be mitigated by reminding test takers of the achieved identities they possess for which there are positive performance expectations.

“In other words, by putting women in a situation where they’re not preoccupied with negative gender stereotypes, you can significantly reduce the gender gap in standardized testing performance,” he said.

“These results suggest that priming a positive achieved identity (selective private college student) can alleviate women’s anxiety about confirming the negative stereotype that ‘women can’t do math,’” said McGlone. “When we primed this positive identity in men—for whom there is no negative stereotype regarding their math acumen—their performance was no better than when their gender was primed.

McGlone tested his hypothesis by priming different social identities among undergraduates prior to administering the Vandenberg Mental Rotation Test (VMRT), a standardized spatial reasoning test linked to math performance. The VMRT typically produces the largest documented gender difference in any cognitive ability, a difference some academics have attributed to genetic differences in intelligence favoring men.

McGlone and his colleagues asked male and female students at Lafayette College in Easton, Pa., to take the VMRT. Prior to the test, the participants completed one of three short questionnaires composed of six questions designed to cue a particular social identity: their residence in the northeastern U.S., their gender, or their status as students in a selective private college.

He found that women who were primed to contemplate their identity as students at a selective private college performed at a significantly higher level on the VMRT than those primed to contemplate their gender or a test-irrelevant identity. In contrast, priming selective private college status among the male participants did not improve their performance. However, priming their gender status (men are better at math) did improve their performance.

Applications for these findings might include eliminating subtle cues from standardized math testing environments that might make gender identity issues salient to women and impair their performance.

“We’re pushing for the College Board and other standardized testing organizations to move demographic questions to the end of the test,” said McGlone. “Testers think they’re just collecting data in asking for gender, ethnic and geographic information, but there’s a subtle—and consequential—communication going on here. It says, ‘Your gender matters.”‘

“By simply manipulating when questions are asked we can appreciably improve SAT scores,” he said. “Ideally, cues that heighten awareness of any negative stereotypes—ascribed or not—should be eliminated from testing environments.”

Photo Source: HeraldTribune

A recent report by Science indicates that the current economic downturn is resulting in an increasing trend of young scientists doing multiple postdocs. This isn’t good news for young scientists because postdoctoral positions are only slightly better paid than the teaching or research assistantships that graduate students receive. In addition, the workload of a postdoctoral researcher is generally the same as that of a graduate student, which often translates to 60 plus hours in the lab per week.

Overall, this trend has two very negative consequences for PhD scientists: 1. It extends the amount of time before a PhD scientist can actually start earning a reasonable salary and thus begin investing in their future and saving for retirement; and 2. For women, it puts incredible constraints on the timing for having children.

Adding more years to the scientific training period is nothing new. In fact the trend, even before this economic downturn, has been that it takes more and more years to become a PhD scientist than ever before. Most of our PhD advisors managed to get their PhDs in only 3 or 4 years, but that was back in the 1970s. Today, the national average is 5.5 years to earn a PhD in chemistry and, unlike in the ’70s or ’80s, a postdoctoral appointment is almost always necessary in order to obtain any academic position, as well as many industry positions. Considering that most postdoctoral positions are 2 to 3 years in length, if one must now complete 2 postdocs before they can find a job, then we are talking about a 15 year investment of time into higher education before landing one’s first job!!! That means that someone who goes straight from high school through college without taking any time off will be 33 years old before they have their first job, which is also the age at which women start encountering tremendous risk and difficulty in having babies.

The additional problem with such an extraordinary investment in time is that women cannot easily have babies if they are working in a laboratory. Due to the dangers that chemicals pose to a pregnancy, women will have to leave the lab. Although there are some research advisors who can find other work for pregnant women to do, it is usually a hindrance to one’s career to have to stay out of the lab for such a long time (10 months). Additionally, as a postdoc, one is performing a short contractual job that requires extraordinary productivity. Most women feel that they will not be fulfilling their job demands if they get pregnant during a postdoc. That means that they must either risk never having children or limiting their job prospects.

The current outlook for PhD scientists seems to be one of outlandish time investment and diminishing returns. Financial planners will tell you that waiting until you are 33 or older to begin saving money for retirement is a huge mistake, but that is the unfortunate situation that most PhD chemists find themselves in these days. Had PhD chemists chosen different fields that offered better returns, in many cases they would have found much more financial security at the end of the day.

Instead of seeking a second postdoc position, we would recommend that PhD scientists broaden their job searches and goals so that they can start reaping the rewards of their higher education sooner, rather than later. However, we know that it is a very difficult place to be in and there are no easy answers. We hope that future scientists are warned sufficiently of the future they face and that economic prosperity will buoy the market again for chemists.

Photo: http://www.math.cmu.edu/~shaikhet/