VCU news

By Tom Gresham

John Ryan, Ph.D., has much he enjoys about his work, but the VCU immunologist said one component of his job provides him with a thrill beyond all others: mentoring a student researcher who suddenly has their “aha” moment.

Something clicks for the student, who has been gaining knowledge and skills gradually in the classroom and laboratory, and they are struck with the realization, “I know how to do this.” Instead of simply following instructions, they have their own ideas. They start to solve problems independently. Their insecurity wanes, and they feel confident about their tasks and their status among the other, more experienced members of the research team. They’re no longer trainees. They’ve become full-fledged researchers.

“As mentors, we get to be the catalyst for that,” Ryan said. “To me, that’s just a tremendous sense of accomplishment. That’s really what I love about my job the very most, and there are many things I love about it, but certainly that’s something I get the most joy out of.”

Ryan, a professor of biology in the College of Humanities and Sciences, is one of a host of scientific researchers on both campuses who welcome both seasoned graduate students and green undergraduates onto their research teams.

Tamara Haque, a junior majoring in clinical laboratory sciences in the School of Allied Health Professions, currently works in Ryan’s lab. Haque has always known that she would pursue a career as a physician. However, she’d never considered integrating medical research into her professional life.

Now, though, after working with Ryan and his research team, she’s become hooked on the idea. She’s had her “aha” moment.

“The ability to have influence on knowledge, on discovery, being the person who is able to broaden the scope of knowledge that we have, feels very rewarding,” Haque said.

The research experience is a critical one for undergraduates hoping to pursue graduate school and a career in science, but the benefits do not flow just one way. In fact, VCU professors who employ undergraduates in their labs speak of them with a fondness that echoes the late VCU chemistry professor John Fenn, Ph.D., winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2002, who once compared himself to a vampire who lived on the energy and enthusiasm of his students.

Undergrads bring with them this sense of discovery, where everything they do is fun.

“I think what happens is if you stay in science for a long time, you tend to forget that there’s so much joy in the discovery, because you get bogged down chasing after the grants, and trying to make the perfect experiment to fit whatever the reviewers want for the next manuscript,” Ryan said. “Undergrads bring with them this sense of discovery, where everything they do is fun. Sometimes we’ve forgotten that, and you rediscover it when you’re working alongside them, which is wonderful.”

The payback for faculty is not merely emotional, though. It’s pragmatic, too. Joyce Lloyd, Ph.D., professor and vice chair of human and molecular genetics in the School of Medicine, utilizes undergraduate researchers in her lab at the Massey Cancer Center. She said the patience required to train undergraduates when they first join the team reaps rewards when they begin to make major contributions to the work.

“I’ve had students who have come into the lab as freshmen, and they have stayed for four years,” Lloyd said. “They have gone from helping someone with a project (to) then gradually (becoming) the person who’s in charge of that project.”

For instance, Lloyd calls Kristen Wade, a senior majoring in bioinformatics, “an integral member of the lab” who recently moved into a new position with more responsibilities when an older student graduated. Because of the skills she’d acquired, Wade was ready for the new role, allowing a seamless transition.

When that transition occurs – when a young researcher transforms from assistant to leader – it creates a “heartfelt feeling” that Jeffrey Dupree, Ph.D., associate professor of anatomy and neurobiology, likens to watching your child grow up. Among Dupree’s current researchers is Carine Binyam, a junior majoring in biology. Binyam has worked with Dupree since she was a freshman, steadily picking up new duties and gaining new insight into her future career options.

 “I got really involved so early when I came in as a freshman, and it’s been a phenomenal experience since then,” Binyam said. “It helped me narrow down my interests. It’s helped me be able to realize the different skills I could potentially have. It’s helped me be able to see what career path I could possibly pick in the future at a very early stage.”

Binyam has presented work from Dupree’s lab at a biomedical conference. Many VCU undergraduate researchers gain that opportunity to co-author papers or lead conference presentations, Ryan said, which moves them from the tall stack to the short stack of graduate school applications, providing a vital push to the next stage of their careers.

And the guidance students receive from their mentors doesn’t end when they graduate and leave the lab. In fact, professors typically maintain relationships with their mentees through their graduate studies and track their progress into the professional world. And then one day the student who wasn’t sure how to use a pipette has become a colleague, equipped to discuss and debate on the level of their mentor.

“These are people who you develop a long-term professional and personal relationship with, and that’s extremely fulfilling,” Ryan said. “There’s not many careers where you get to do that.”

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