Name: Ling Shao

Occupation: MD/Ph.D. student (2nd year) at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine

Level of Education: Grad of University of California at Berkeley 1998

1) What made you decide to make science your career?

It's a combination of a lot of circumstances, and a lot of decisions. The main determinant is really a curiosity about things that is not satisfied by watching the Discovery channel or just reading a textbook. Naturally the only way to satisfy deeper curiosity is just to do research. [I was] really interested in how the human body works, so medical research seemed like the right way to go.

2) What experience sparked your interest in this field?

I used to volunteer at a hospital when I was young. Here is a good story about why I got interested in biology. I had a friend who was very interested in Biology together... If you have a friend that is interested in something that you are interested in, the two of you tend to have this synergistic action on each other. I remember one day we were bored and so we drove out to the beach just to walk around and we happened to find a jellyfish floating just in the water. So, we actually bought the jellyfish home and we dissected it. That's just curiosity. I did research in college. I worked at UCSF (University of California at San Francisco) I worked in the department of neurology with Chairman Steven Hauser. We worked on multiple sclerosis that's where I first became interested in Immunology. There's some degree of luck involved in what you end up doing and it just so happened that my first real research experience was with him [in] immunology

3) What exactly do you do on a day to day basis?

Right now I study a lot. I could tell you what a typical week looks like. On Monday we have class from 9 until 3 or 4. We take your typical medical school classes, we take pharmacology where we learn about the different drugs and right now we're taking a course on the kidney (renal course) and we just finished a course on nutrition. On Tuesday we have class in the morning and then our class disperses to hospitals around the metropolitan area. We practice being doctors. We see real people, real patients and we talk to them and we do what's called history and physical. The most exciting part about [this] is when you really get to talk to people, that's why most people are here. Most people aren't here to read the textbook for three hours a day. We have classes the rest of the week. In my spare time I have to keep up on current events in the scientific sense. We have to read journal articles and find out what's going on, what other people are doing and what other exciting discoveries are being made.

4) What qualities have you developed that make you a good scientist?

I could tell you about people, who I admire, who I think, are good scientists. The first thing is that they are very curious. They have a question or a number of questions that they really want to answer. That's really what gets them up in the morning, it's the curiosity; "I want to answer this question". [Next] they have to be intelligent, you don't necessarily have to be a genius to do good research. The people who I think do the best science are people who think a little bit differently. They look at a problem a little bit differently and they take all of the facts. You can read a book and memorize a number of facts, and I can look at a book and memorize a number of facts, but a good scientist can look at that body of knowledge and synthesize it in a different way and think about it in a different way and come up with the right question. That may be the most important thing -- the ability to come up with the right question. Formulating a way to answer those questions is more technical; to be able to ask those questions is really the mark of a really good scientist. [The] formulation part makes a good scientist; the answering part is not as important nowadays. One guy did it all, but now we have so many different specialties. You have to rely on other people, you can't possibly, know everything at this point, really. So it's important to be able to count on other people, and for other people to be able to count on you.

5) What is the level of education someone would need to go into your field?

Or the field you're interested in? Someone who has the MD/Ph.D. has several options. The two most obvious options are, you can purely do medical things. So you can just be a clinician, just see patients, that's one side. The other obvious way you can go is you can just do research, academic research or biotech with pharmaceutical research, that's the other way you can go. For the most part being MD/Ph.D. is geared towards something they call transitional research. That's like, how do I take basic science research, that I or someone else did in a research laboratory-benchtop and how do I bring that to the bedside_ benchtop to bedside. How do you do that? How does something that I do in the lab benefit the patient who is there in the hospital.

6) What other labs have you worked in and how do they compare to this lab?

Each lab is really different they're all different. I worked in a lab [a] long, long time ago. [It] was [in] a neurobiology lab at Brandy University. We actually had to build our own equipment from scratch. We bought very little and we had to build everything ourselves. Contrast that [to] when I worked with UCSF we bought everything. We did'nt't really do any of the menial labor of research. We had buffers, [but] we did'nt't mix them ourselves, we bought them. When we had gels to run, we did'nt't pour them, we bought them, they were precast. There's a big difference in terms of money for labs and then space is [also] a huge issue. Remember Dr. Claudio, she had this huge lab with only like two people working there. There are other labs, [for example] a friend of mine, he works in a lab that has twenty people, and they're on top of each other. So it's a big difference; space and money. What really makes a lab is the people who work there, lab space does'nt't make a lab. [You want] people who are interested in a lot of different things you want people who can motivate you to work.

7) What is the working environment like in a lab and how does it compare to an office?

A lot different! There's a huge difference between a laboratory and an office. That's part of the reason why I chose research is that I don't want to work in an office. I don't want to work in a cubicle; I don't want to have to wear a tie everyday and a suit everyday. You can go to lab wearing whatever you want, well, within reasonable limits. You can be comfortable and you make your own hours which is a huge advantage, that's not to say that you don't work hard, but you work hard when you want to work hard. It takes a lot of planning because an experiment has a life of it's own. You have to take care of your experiment but really it's not a 9-5 job. One day you may have to work all day, but the next day maybe you won't have to work at all. It's flexible like that.

8) Are there enough people of color pursuing careers in Science?

Do you have any ideas why? I was thinking about that on my walk over, I was trying to think of all of the people of color that were scientist here at Mt. Sinai. I have to tell you, that it was difficult for me to think of more than five people who are senior scientists working here at Mt. Sinai. Maybe that's partially my ignorance but it seems like there are'nt't enough, especially in the medical field there are'nt't enough. That's why we have organizations like students for equal opportunity in medicine (SEOM). No matter how we like to deny it, we end of becoming what our parents were, or something in that neighborhood. Most of the people I know who are in science or in medicine, their parent's were in science or medicine. That's not true all the time, but it's easier if you're your parent's were there and when you were growing up, you just grew up with it. It just seems natural that way, so in that sense it's a really vicious cycle where if your parents are'nt't in science or medicine then you're not going to be or your children are'nt't going to be. My dad is an engineer. He studied nuclear engineering in college, [but] that's not what he does now. He's an electrical engineer. The sciences, that's where my family goes.

9) In your opinion what should be done to increase the race ratio in favor of people of color?

Not enough people know what it's like. A lot of people have the wrong impression of scientist as being like lab rats, and just strange eccentric people. I think if more people are exposed to science I think they like it and pursue it as a career, on one hand. On the other hand, institutions have to make it more accessible to people. In terms of economics like to come to Mt. Sinai for medical school it cost something like $23,000 for tuition. Then to live in New York City, to survive in NYC it can cost you $40,000. If that's not within your family budget, that's not within most people's family budget so it's certainly a problem. Science is a luxury almost, I think I'm lucky in the sense that I had the luxury of choosing science as an occupation. Where as my parent's could have easily told me, "look Ling, you have to go out and get a job right out of school". Then I would never have had the opportunity. In terms of the Ph. D. -- if you do a Ph.D. alone, for six years and even longer then that you are pretty poor. They don't pay researchers a whole lot of money. If the circumstances are okay then it's fulfilling. The program you're in is great (Secondary Education Through Health). It's still pretty limited. There's a science secondary school on 96th street. [They] introduce biological sciences and it's directed at minority. I'm trying to get involved in that

10) What hardships or obstacles did you encounter in pursuing Science as a career?

There are a lot of barriers in Science to women. In general around the country the number of women who are tenured professors is vastly lower than the number of men who are tenured professors. What I mean by tenured is that they're actually permanent members of the faculty. Women also have an extra consideration in terms of raising a family and if that's something they wanted to do...it should'nt't be, but it is an obstacle for them. In terms of people of color, I can't explain, it's just very few people of color in science at this point.

11) Had you ever considered going into any other field? If so, which one?

Not seriously. I always thought that I'd be a teacher somewhere and maybe I still will but only in addition to doing basic science research.

12) What kind of experience would someone need in order to do what you do?

The hands on lab work is really just something you just learn by doing. Someone just sits there and shows you how to do it and then you just do it. That's the manual part of science, the mental part of science is something that you have to develop over time. That's a certain amount of critical thinking and a lot of education behind it. There are people who do really good research in college, there are some people who do really good research in high school. If you just want to do medical research a lot of doctors do medical research. You can get a job in research as a lab tech(nician) out of college. All the way up to the extreme, you can get a Ph.D.

13) How has being a person of color effected your success?

I'd like to think that it has'nt't but I know that's not true. I just feel like I have to prove myself, you have to work extra hard or you have to think of an extra brilliant idea. Otherwise you're not equal

14) What is the best or most exciting aspect of working in this field? Why?

I guess the greatest thing is that there's the possibility however minute it might be that you could do something that could vastly improve the lives, or even save the lives of your fellow human beings. That's the most grand idealist view. The selfish reason is that you get to do whatever you want. The lab is the biggest playground. Everyday is different. You're not sitting there banging away at a keyboard like a monkey.

15) What skills have you gained here that stick out in your memory?

I've learned how to deal with failure as well as success. As you move on, things get more and more difficult. You fail at a lot more things than you succeed at. You have to deal with a whole lot of people in this line of work that's a really important skill. It's almost being a politician.

16) What are your goals/plans for the future?

I want to pursue a career in medically oriented research. I want to hopefully pursue a career in education, where I can maybe interest people in science.

17) What are some things a person at 14 years old could do to prepare for a career in science?

There are a lot of things, just be curious about the world around you. How do things work, just ask the question, "why do things work the way they do?" Or, "why does something look the way it does". You can [those] questions about anything. Why is it that I'm constantly sneezing around cats? Anything, just be curious about things. I think an important skill that people learn over time is that books aren't always right. In fact books are wrong fairly often, and it's because we are limited by our knowledge. So at some point you have to question what you read in a book and say, "is that a fact or is that just someone's opinion?" In terms of preparing for science, really you can go anywhere, go anyway and end up doing something in science. You don't have to a mathematician you don't have to be a biology major, [it's] not necessary. I think the main thing about Science is that it's a way of thinking and everything else [like] the manual part you can learn, there are a certain amount of facts that you need to know, but anyone can learn that.

18) Is there any other advice that you would give to a young person of color who is interested in any aspect of science?

Don't get discouraged. There is a lot of opportunity out there. I'm one the kind of people that believe that hopefully there's justice in the world and if you work hard for something, then you'll be rewarded for it. So one two, or three setbacks should'nt discourage people. If you want to do something, not only science, but if you want to do anything, definitely be almost stubborn about it.

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