Mina Bissell, Ph.D.

Dr. Mina Bissell is Distinguished Scientist at Berkeley Lab: She is the only woman and the only biologist with this rank, but she hopes the number will increase soon! She is a pioneer in breast cancer research, where she has changed a number of established paradigms. She postulated and then proved the significance of the extracellular matrix (ECM) signaling, the dominance of the microenvironment (context), and organ architecture in regulation of gene expression in normal and malignant cells. Her laboratory has developed novel assays and techniques to prove that “phenotype is dominant over genotype.” She was the Director of the Cell and Molecular Biology Division and the Associate Laboratory Director for all Life Sciences at Berkeley Lab, where she recruited excellent scientists, many of whom are women.

She is most proud of having mentored more than 90 successful graduate students and fellows and authored more than 370 publications. She has given more than 100 “named and distinguished” lectures. She has received many awards and honors including the Lawrence Award and Medal, the Clowes/Eli Lilly Award, the Pezcoller Foundation-AACR International Award, the AACR Distinguished Lectureship in Breast Cancer Research, two “Innovator Awards” of the U.S. Department of Defense for breast cancer research, the Brinker Komen Foundation Award, the Discovery Health Channel Medical Honor and Medal, the FASEB Excellence in Science Award, the American Cancer Society's Medal of Honor, the Alexander Bodini Foundation Prize for Scientific Excellence in Medicine, the BCRF Foundation’s Jill Rose Award, and the first Lifetime Achievement Award from Berkeley Lab.

Dr. Bissell has been honored as a fellow of most U.S. academies, including the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the American Philosophical Society, and the Royal Society of Chemistry. She has received honorary doctorates from the Pierre & Marie Curie University in Paris and the University of Copenhagen.

http://www.lbl.gov/LBL-Programs/lifesciences/BissellLab/main.html

1. What inspires you to work in STEM?

I have always been passionate and curious "to know" why we are who we are. In high school and then college, I enjoyed the STEM courses and did very well in them. When I realized how much of what we do that is important for people's lives and well-being comes from the work and labor of those who work in STEM fields, I decided to be a chemist in college, a bacterial geneticist in graduate school, and once I began to work with cancer viruses during my postdoctoral work, I became interested in cancer research, now more and more I am interested in evolution and believe that Darwin and Lamarck were both right!

2. What excites you about your work at the Energy Department/Berkeley Lab?

Very early on during my academic career, Melvin Calvin, a Nobel Laureate and the Director of a Division at Berkeley Lab, said to us: “The most fertile ground is where the ocean and the shore meet.” I was already passionate about connections between fields of inquiry and had also realized that I looked at biology differently from many of my colleagues because my background was not classical biology, and dogmatic textbooks had not corrupted my imagination. Biology excited me because we knew so little about so many things when I was in graduate school (we still know only a fraction of what we need to know!), but I realized that unless we combined different disciplines and brought physicists, chemists, bioengineers, bioinformaticists and even mathematicians together, we would only make incremental progress. This is why I was happy to join Berkeley Lab, helped establish and run Life Sciences Division for 16 years, and have stayed here after I stepped down, because this place exemplifies the most fertile ground for exciting science. Did you know that all the Nobel Prize winners in UC Berkeley did their experiments at Berkeley Lab??

We are now applying this multiple not only to breast cancer research and the complexity of biological gene expression with grants from the NIH, DOD, and private foundations, but also to low-dose radiation (LDR) research with grants from the BER Office of the DOE. I am quite excited about this cross-field transfer of ideas and model systems. This research offers an opportunity to intelligently use our considerable knowledge in basic biology to deal with the effects of LDR in health and disease. The data so far are conflicting; thus, unbiased science and relevant and physiological human model systems for radiation-sensitive tissues such as breast and blood are crucial for understanding whether LDR is additive and harmful, neutral, or even protective at very low doses (like vaccines). If the former, we need to be prepared for how to protect ourselves, and in case of the latter, we will have an opportunity to save many many billions of dollars instead of trying to make the microenvironment better than pristine. We also can save a lot of anxiety. Either way, we need to know the reality using solid and believable data.

3. How can our country engage more women, girls, and other underrepresented groups in STEM?

By giving them more inspiring teachers who are not prejudiced about girls and STEM careers -- and also role models. Fathers also play crucial roles. My family was crucial in early years in how and why I could do what I did. Most (of course by all means not all) of our science education in primary and secondary schools is poorly designed and taught by teachers who either are not passionate about STEM fields or are prejudiced about girls and their ability to do worthwhile STEM research. This leads to insecurity and becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy!

4. Do you have tips you would recommend for someone looking to enter your field of work?

Many! Here are a few:

a) Most importantly, trust yourself. You can do it if you believe in yourself and remain passionate.

b) Do not listen to those who say you cannot have a career in these fields, and also have a family and children. Some of our most creative and successful scientists in biology and cancer research are now women -- with families and children. Forty-five years ago, there was only one professor at Harvard Medical School who happened to be a woman. Many other professors and heads of departments did not believe that women could do medicine or medical sciences. I used to hear that all the time, now they say women can do biology and medicine but not "hard sciences"!

c) Persist!

d) Read some of the women’s life stories or anecdotes on their Web sites. There is dignity in work. Do not be dependent on others for your livelihood.

e) Exercise.

f) You have lots of time: One year here or there does not matter.

g) You only have one life: Do something good with it. Do GOOD and do not become arrogant!.

h) Think of an alternative career just in case: Education in STEM areas prepares you for many other careers you may want to pursue. Also a plan B takes away a lot of the anxieties young women (and young men) have when thinking about life decisions. My second choice was opening a restaurant if I could not get grant money (it was tough for awhile). I was sure if I had to do it, it would have been a good one!

5. When you have free time, what are your hobbies?

I have almost no free time, but I make time to see my children and grandchildren, take hikes, and exercise (when I was younger, I hiked in the High Sierras with family and friends). I used to do ballet -- I still like to dance, I read a lot, I like to go to movies, opera, ballet, and concerts, but I am passionate about theater and go as often as I can.