Every Wednesday, our ‘Away from home’ blog series features one Indian postdoc working in a foreign lab recounting his/her experience of working there, the triumphs and challenges, the cultural differences, what they miss about India, as well as some top tips for postdocs headed abroad. You can join in the online conversation using the #postdochat hashtag.
Today’s addition to the series is Archana Swami, who completed her Ph.D thesis at IGIB, New Delhi, India and is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Laboratory of Nanomedicine and Biomaterials of the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, USA and part of the Robert Langer group at The David Koch Institute at MIT, Boston, USA.
Archana Swami with her son Soumil.
Science and I
The sense of ‘small’ was imbibed in me at age 6 while trying to dissect rose petals and seeing its tiniest part. This affair went on in school and college spending extra hours to see root sections or molds grown on food under microscope. During Ph.D, I learnt to apply the knowledge of chemistry at sub-micron scale and to perform surface chemistry at nano-scale. This gave me a whole new perspective of creating something ‘functional’ that is a thousand fold smaller than human hair. I learned to package nucleic acids in nano-carriers to be used for manipulation of genetic machinery of cells.
This exposure at IGIB made me ready for taking on the next challenge. The next phase of my journey began with a postdoctoral fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), Harvard Medical School (HMS) under the supervision of Prof. Omid Farokhzad (BWH, HMS) and Prof. Robert Langer, at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Picking the right question
In this group, I learned to ‘pick the right question’ and think about how the answers will impact the next five years of medicine. Our group focuses on working in the field of potentially translational nanomedicine. As a postdoc, I am responsible to steer a project starting from experimental design to building collaboration and targeting potential funding sources for extension of the project to next level, a step closer to translation into clinic. With a pinch of luck in the recipe of smart work, a project can lead to the basis of a start-up company in places like these.
In the past several years I have worked with different biomaterials and have utilized these materials to package vulnerable macromolecules such as cytokines and siRNA, to create nanomedicines. These nanocarriers have potential to safely deliver toxic drugs for cancer treatment, in a site-specific manner. I have worked on developing nanoparticles to target metastatic tumors besides primary tumors, which is challenging especially in case of bone metastasis. It draw my interest toward exploring other potential applications of nanocarriers, for developing technologies for bone regeneration, quick healing of boney-fractures and for creating improved surgical implants. This gave me an insight to cell signaling pathways, and to choose relevant targets for combination therapy of cancer.
The best thing about my lab
The best thing about working in my group is that the scientific quest is not limited by the specific aims of the assigned project. A new great idea is always encouraged.
The scientific community in Boston is so enriched that it’s very easy to find good collaborations and learn new science with them. Boston is multicultural and has an awesome public transport system. You can do well without a car in Boston.
It is not easy to create your niche in such a competitive environment and keep up to the expectations when you are a working mother. To be able to stand up in such circumstances, the price has to be paid by your loved ones. My supportive husband Tathagata and son Soumil are the one who keeps me motivated each day.
A word for aspiring postdocs
Finding postdoc positions in Boston would mean contacting individual groups of your research interest. There is no easy way! A word for aspiring postdocs looking at the US and young parents: the US education system will imbibe logical thinking, creativity and imagination in your child.
I miss the sensory delight that India is
Whenever I see the cells in a fluorescent microscope lighting up with fluorescent nanoparticles, I am reminded of the lights of the Diwali festival. I miss masala chai and samosa with family and friends, gol gappa and khasta kachori of Kamla Nagar in New Delhi. I miss India for its earthly fragrance in the rains and miss listening to Vividh Bharati on radio every day.
My long term goal is to create cost effective diagnostic and treatment options for rural India with the help of nanotechnology. Hopefully I would be able to begin working on this soon!
Archana Swami joins the thriving population of Indian postdocs in the West coast of the US. Stay tuned as we add more such promising postdocs every Wednesday to our interactive Away from home map pictured below. Please feel free to suggest names of postdocs from unusual places and disciplines we haven’t covered yet.
