Table 1: Collaboration Generation

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Sophie Petropoulos, PhD

What is Your Current Position?

Principal Investigator at Karolinska Institutet, Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Division of Obstetrics and Gynaecology

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

My research interests focus on how early events such as parental or environmental exposures result in fetal reprogramming, ultimately leading to the onset of disease or disorder later in life.  I am primarily aiming to unravel the effects of preimplantation exposures/stress (as occurring during artificial reproductive technologies) on fetal outcome and long-term human development/health.  Understanding key gene pathways that are particularly susceptible to insults during this specific window of development may provide potential targets for therapeutic intervention.  Further, these studies will provide important insights into human development, fetal programming, stem cell research and may improve current clinical practice with Artificial Reproductive Technologies.

What has been the most pivotal moment in your career?

Receiving the Mats Sundin Fellowship in Developmental Health and relocating to the Karolinska Institutet, where my research discovered novel insights of human preimplantation development (Petropoulos et al, Cell 2016).

What is one piece of advice you would give to a trainee?

Always pursue the scientific questions you are truly passionate about; the rest will fall into place.

 

Jim Roberts, MD

What is Your Current Position?

I am an investigator in the Magee-Womens Research Institute and a Professor in the Department of Obstetrics Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, Epidemiology and Clinical and Translational Research.

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

I am the Principal Investigator of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded Global Pregnancy Collaboration. I also am the training director for an American Heart group project training grant. I also serve on the advisory board of the Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women's Health (BIRCWH) training grant. I also have several mentees within training programs and junior faculty. I also serve as a co-advisor for a student in the MD PhD training program.

What has been the most pivotal moment in your career?

I was encouraged to do research as a resident. I now realize largely because of the very busy schedule I had that I was frustrated and decided research was not going to be part of my future career, although I had decided at this point on becoming an academic obstetrician gynecologist. I stumbled into a research program at the Cardiovascular Research Institute at the University of California at San Francisco, fell in love with research (in the setting I had time to do it) and the rest is history.

What is one piece of advice you would give to a trainee?

I think the absolute necessity for a successful academic career is persistence. In no other occupation do you "throw yourself under the bus" putting yourself at the mercy of others’ judgment in the way we do in academics. Papers, grants, presentations all carry with them the risk of failure. Success comes from recognizing these challenges, rising to the occasion and never giving up.

 

Kent Thornburg, PhD

What is Your Current Position?

I currently direct two related institutes: The Moore Institute for Nutrition and Wellness which emphasizes studies of nutrition in pregnancy and the Center for Developmental Health which studies animal models of fetal programming.

What are your current research endeavors and/or other academic contributions?

I have expertise in cardiopulmonary physiology, physiology of pregnancy, placental transport and heart development. I study heart development in the fetal sheep model, placental lipid transport in the human and diet interventions in human populations.

What has been the most pivotal moment in your career?

I do not have a pivotal moment. However, I can vividly remember times in my laboratory we realized that we had made an important discovery.

What is one piece of advice you would give to a trainee?

Think broadly and think big. Work with outstanding investigators who will put your success above their own.