I didn't have a clue what I wanted to be but I I did have an interest in science when I was a
little girl I thought maybe I'd be a ballerina I thought maybe I would be some kind of forest
service person that worked in the woods I thought maybe I'd be a ski racer but I
always loved science it wasn't that I was born knowing that I wanted to be a scientist would
always be a scientist the notion that every child has to know exactly what they're going
to do I don't think history I could never possibly have imagined that I would become
a research scientist and professor in a major American University I work on stem cells and
I've always been interested in how cells adopt a certain faith I want to make a difference in
how people can use those cells and and understand them at a fundamental level as a brain scientist
what I do is I'm interested in how our brains change with learning and experience kids brains
are kind of like sponges and ours as adults are not like sponges anymore when I was in
sixth grade I I found a skull up in the hills then I went to the medical library digging out
all these this information on how to determine what animal it was based on a couple of teeth
it turned out to be a red beard oh I must admit I was pleased it wasn't just the cow
my first memorable science experiment was in high school I did an experiment studying a
plant hormone called auxin if you gave it to plants it made them grow like mad and so I
thought I'm going to get a bunch of sweet peas and grow them in a little box and I'm going to
give half of them oxen and I'm going to give half of them control vehicle solution that
it's just water the result of my experiment was that I killed all of the plants every plant died
including the control plants I did not get an A I don't remember exactly how we met you really
do you we got here the same year like in 1978 so you know this is 30 years we met right away when
we became professors we were the first in a way at the med school we were the first know under
trained basic science in science tenure track we were hired on affirmative action yeah they hired
it's truly my couple of women Noah gave $25,000 to each department we got the hour you know when
we came I think in many ways we were viewed in the most positive way by our colleagues as
experiments I think it was an experiment people were watching to see how we did what I decided
was that the way to succeed was not to do things the way everyone else did I didn't want to compete
on the obvious questions but rather to thinking in untraditional way I think it's more typical
for us to choose not to go right into the center of a competitive fray I think we were very happy
to take other approaches and look and start to do other experiments and it's certainly true I
mean we never would have found these HLA genes in the brain if we've been working in a more you know
more of a mainstream if I was doing this career I wasn't doing it just to do what someone else could
do I wanted to try and make a difference in how people thought challenge dogma and I think that's
been the hallmark of the kinds of experiments I've done I still remember my first grant from
NIH one cell fusion and reprogramming of cells the study section wrote this is highly unlikely
to work however we'll give dr. Blau a chance because because it looks extremely interesting
and she'll learn something worth one but it gave me the chance to do the whole work that I which
I built my career on plasticity cell-fate right and now it's coming back in such a wonderful way
to even the early days of your experiments and coming increasingly relevant again it's really
exciting and the mystery of the unknown whether it's about regeneration or whether it's about how
the brain works our learners it's a huge mystery so there's a kind of waning immunology and the
brain which you're playing area thanks Helen and I are really like you know the yin and the yang of
life and the career of a woman scientists Helen had in fact had to face the challenge of having
both a career and family to raise and I waited too long so my challenge was to have a career and also
not have a family that's an interesting way to put it Carla instead of saying having a family
is a burden in a draw away from one's work like this why not having a family is equally yeah and
they're just different very interesting yeah I think that women are often feeling but it's
much too big sacrifice and too hard to go on and they look at us and what we've done and it's not
thinking I want to be her they often don't I think it's much too hard the melding of career
and you know family is still extremely challenging from time to time I've wondered what I should be
doing and I've entertained alternatives but I'm never as excited as what I do in experiment the
thing that's sort of wonderful about you know being a scientist is that the answers even when
you get an answer a very satisfying answer the next question pops up it's like a great book
that you just never want to end I am completely turned on by the experiments and thinking about
the next step and I feel like they're Sherlock Holmes trying to solve the problem and the fun
thing is you not only get to try to answer those customs but you train your students so there's a
kind of legacy which is also quite marvelous both of us have continued to work and enjoy our work
and thrive and frankly in many ways I know for me it's been a wonderful kind of haven I never
expected that I would do it actually because there's so few role models I didn't think it was
beautiful they took a big risk on us they might not have hired it they gave us a chance and they
were not at all sure we succeed because it was a I'm at Stanford should be really fast yeah I mean
that's true and we're grateful and they should be proud the preceding program is copyrighted by the
Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford junior University please visit us at med.stanford.edu
you