Originally from Brazil, Felipe Karam Teixeira has studied and worked in four different countries during his scientific career to date, learning two new languages and adapting to different working cultures. He feels that it is part of his mission to show others that they can pursue a career in science regardless of their background.
"Good and motivated people are everywhere. We just need to find them and make them feel like scientific research is something they can do whilst giving them the right support.”
A first look into science. I grew up in Rio de Janeiro and never really thought about studying biology. As a teenager though, my older brother, who was actually the first scientist in our family, started inviting me to come along on weekends and help him with lab work, changing solutions and feeding cells. When it was my turn to apply to university, I thought, well, I think I can do this too!
I did my undergraduate degree in Biology at the University of Rio de Janeiro and again, under my brother’s influence, started volunteering in the lab twice a week, doing very basic work like washing the lab glassware. I really enjoyed the environment and the experience of being in the lab, so decided to apply for a Master’s degree in Genetics. This was a 2-year course, mostly studying rice, a useful model system in genetics due to its relatively small genome and like humans, it has two complete sets of chromosomes. I learnt a lot from the experience, not only about the genetics of rice, but also that I really enjoyed working in the lab and doing scientific research!
When I finished those 2 years, once again, my brother played a big role in my future and suggested that I could do a PhD abroad. Perhaps he believed in me more than I believed in myself! I applied to a studentship from the Brazilian government to study in Paris. It was highly competitive, because there were only about 5 studentships for the whole country and I didn’t really think that I would get it, but I did!
A new country and a new challenge. The transition to Paris and the PhD was interesting as it involved both a cultural and a scientific shift. After looking at rice genetics during my Master’s, I wanted to start considering a more tractable genetic organism, a model that could be more easily modified, so I thought, why not go into Arabidopsis?
Arabidopsis is a small flowering plant widely used to study genetics and molecular biology. I spent around 6 months reading every article on Arabidopsis, searching for something that I could find interesting and would be able to propose as a project for my PhD. There were a lot of options, but what attracted me most was something I’d first learned about during an undergrad molecular biology course: genomic imprinting. Genomic imprinting is the process where only one copy of a gene is expressed while the other is supressed across each generation, a phenomenon that defines a field called epigenetics, and that I found truly fascinating.
I made a list of researchers whose labs were at the leading edge of the plant epigenetics field, and was very lucky to be accepted by the first one on my list, Dr Vincent Colot at the Institut de Biologie de l'École Normale Supérieure in Paris.
I stayed in Paris for three years for my PhD, with the idea that once this was finished I would go back to Brazil. However, there aren’t a lot of opportunities for research back home, especially in my field. I was also thinking about doing something different. Both my Master’s and PhD had been in plants, first rice and then Arabidopsis, and I wanted to see if my findings on genetic inheritance were also true in animal models such as Drosophila (fruit flies) or C elegans (nematode worms).
Image on the left: Fluorescence microscopy image showing the fruit fly ovary: germline is coloured in magenta; cell membranes are coloured in cyan. Credit: Katarina Grobicki
Moving to a new field. As my idea of changing topics developed, I started discussing the possibility of moving my research focus from plants to animals with two prominent researchers in the field. They both said it could be a good idea and if I really wanted to do it, it was better to do it just after finishing my PhD. If I started working as a Postdoc in plants, I would never be able to move!
So, with that in mind, I started applying to labs that were either working in Drosophila or C. elegans and ended up moving to New York. I joined Ruth Lehman’s lab, Head of the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine at the time, to work on genetic inheritance in Drosophila. The lab was very strong in developmental biology, which I didn’t know a lot of, coming from plants, but I brought my own knowledge in epigenetics and regulation of gene expression.
It was very difficult in the beginning because I went from the top of my field to a completely different area of research. It’s very different doing genetics in flies to doing genetics in plants. The first year PhD students in the lab knew a whole lot more than I did! The first couple of years were very challenging, but I was lucky to have a very encouraging supervisor, who was also very supportive of my change from plants to animals – in reality, I believe that was what made her want to give me the opportunity. She gave me time to learn, it was a very formative time for me. It felt like I was doing a PhD again!
Image on the right: Drosophila in the Fly Facility, Department of Genetics.
A first taste of Cambridge. The first time I came to Cambridge was by Ruth’s suggestion. Not long after I moved to New York, she suggested that I apply to do a Wellcome Trust week-long course on Drosophila, normally targeted for PhD students. It was also my first time in the Department of Genetics! The course was at Downing College and Steve Russell (now Head of the Department) invited all students to visit the Department and see the facilities available.
Once I finished my Postdoc in New York, I started looking for other positions, both in the US and Europe. I had a few offers in France and the US, but I decided to apply to the Wellcome Trust/Royal Society Sir Henry Dale Fellowship, with the support of the Department of Genetics, and moved to Cambridge in 2017.
This move was difficult too, because it was yet again a completely different culture, different from France and different from the US. Moving to France for my PhD was challenging because of the language, moving to the US was challenging because of the work environment. Moving to Cambridge was yet another big change, but I had a lot of support from the Department and colleagues, helping me navigate this very intricate system of colleges, terms, and students. The first year was a lot about adapting and finding my feet again, but the second year I was able to recruit people to the lab and we could kick off our research.
Different perspectives are fundamental in science. I’ve not only changed countries, I’ve changed research fields and I think that is actually quite attractive and useful in science. I can look at things differently, knowing how genetic processes work in plants and animals, it gives me a broad view of the subject, which in turn helps me also stick to the right questions. I think some of the opportunities I had were because of my decision to change fields.
I have tried to keep this broad scientific and technical perspective in the work my research group does now, where we use fruit flies to study two specific sides of how genetic information in DNA is passed on across generations. Firstly, we try to understand how germline cells protect our genomes to not change too much from generation to generation, whilst still allowing genomes to gradually evolve over time. The second focus of our group is much more on developmental biology, trying to understand how the germ cell makes more germ cells every generation.
Working in these two different areas, sometimes makes our research look like a really broad bunch of ideas. But in my view, it makes working in the lab more interesting, and I think the students find the variety stimulating too. Maybe challenging at times, they need to step out of their comfort zones, having to explain to the other half of the lab what they do – but it promotes the sharing of ideas and techniques and makes the experience very enriching. It’s important to me that we don’t become too narrow-minded, that we don’t focus on just one thing. I hope we can keep this broad-ranging vision.
It doesn’t matter where you come from, if you’re good, you’re good. I chose to come to Cambridge because I felt like this was my place. I feel valued both for my knowledge, but also for the path that has led me to where I am now, it shows resilience and the ability to adapt. And students relate to that too. I’m very open about the struggles I’ve been through. At first glance, they might only see the success, but I want them to know that it was hard and that sometimes I didn’t think I was good enough.
I believe that for me, being in Cambridge for the week-long course on Drosophila during my PhD was fundamental to help me see myself here. Giving people from the outside the opportunity to experience the research environment at Cambridge is key to encouraging diverse applicants to research roles. They need to experience it, to feel like they can belong.
This is why last summer the lab was happy to host a student from the Experience Postgrad Life Sciences Programme, a summer research course which gives opportunities to talented students who might not otherwise have access to placements or other scientific training. It was great to offer research experience to the student, but also to share stories of different research journeys; I told the student ‘it doesn’t matter where you come from, if you’re good, you’re good’. It’s so important for people to know that if they’re passionate about science, whichever field they choose, and are willing to work hard, they can be successful.
There is more to do, I hope we can do more. I feel that we need to do more to attract students from diverse backgrounds, from under-represented groups. Even myself, I come from a working-class family. My parents couldn’t help me much, I had to live off my stipend as a student, and I was lucky enough that I didn’t need to send any money home to support them, which is something that happens a lot. I think there is more to do, I hope we can do more. I think financial support is one of the issues we need to tackle if we truly want to attract people from diverse backgrounds.
Good and motivated people are everywhere. We just need to find them and make them feel like scientific research is something they can do whilst giving them the right support. I think diversity is not just only ‘we want you here’, but more so ‘we really like that you’re here’. Celebrate their presence and show that we truly believe that our community is richer, because it includes them.
“In many years, at the end of my academic career, amongst hopefully some cool science, I would like to be able to say that one of my greatest achievements was paying it forward.”
Felipe Karam Teixeira is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Genetics and Physiology, Development and Neuroscience. He is also a member of the Functional and Evolutionary Genomics and Reproduction, Development and Lifelong Health Research Themes in the School of Biological Sciences.