(soft gentle music)

- [Mary] Today I'm joined

by doctoral candidate, Daisy Hoagland

from the Icahn School of
Medicine at Mount Sinai.

As an early career researcher
in biomedical sciences

at this interesting point in history,

Daisy's work has been overtaken by COVID.

Of her dozen or so papers so far,

almost all of them have been on COVID.

Her work has added to
the flood of crucial data

on the pandemic, including the development

of antiviral compounds.

But how has the redirection
of resources affected

her educational and career goals?

And how many other doctoral

and postdoctoral students
have been affected

in similar ways?

Let's find out.

Welcome, Daisy.

- [Daisy] Thank you so
much for having me, Mary.

And to the Eureka Sounds of
Science podcast for having me.

I'm excited to be here today.

- [Mary] We're really excited to have you.

Thank you so much for coming.

So can you tell me first about
what drew you to a career

in science obviously before the pandemic?

- [Daisy] Yeah, absolutely.

It actually started in high school.

I went to a vocational school

in New Jersey called
Biotechnology High School.

And so, it's like a
public vocational school

and it kind of sent me on the STEM track,

and I ended up going to
the University of Vermont

and studying microbiology.

And there, I realized quickly
that I wanted to be involved

in actual lab science.

So I started doing a work study position

and eventually doing research for credit

in Dr. Yvonne Janssen-Heininger's lab

on where we studied allergic
asthma models in mice,

and specifically reprogramming

of metabolism in the
context of asthma models.

And so, I was really interested
in doing wet lab research,

but after I graduated,

I actually really need to convince myself

that I wanted to stay in science

because I knew it takes a lot to be able

to spend like at least
a decade of your life

at the bench while you're getting--

- [Mary] Absolutely.

- [Daisy] Yeah, all of these degrees.

So I actually took a year
and I did AmeriCorps Vista,

which is basically I volunteered

at a STEM mentorship nonprofit

in the bay area of California.

- [Mary] Oh, okay.

- [Daisy] But basically,
yeah, but then two weeks in,

I learned a lot.

I learned a lot of
project management skills

that I think are actually very useful

for like how I'm working now.

But two weeks in, I was like,

"Oh my gosh, like somebody
give me a pipette."

Like I just felt totally
out of my comfort zone,

like I needed to be at the bench

or I knew that I wanted
to do wet lab science.

So then I just immediately
started applying

to PhD programs that year.

And then, I got into Mount Sinai
and I moved to the city so.

- [Mary] Wow.

That's a quite the criss-cross
of the country there.

- [Daisy] Yeah.

So I definitely have a less
specifically traditional path

than a lot of doctoral students.

I've always been on the STEM track,

but I've also always been interested

in a lot of other things as well.

But because a lot of students,

they will do like go
straight into a PhD program

or they'll spend a couple of
years being a lab technician

or a research assistant in a lab.

But so I just did it a
little bit differently.

- [Mary] Yeah.

I mean I guess there's benefits

to both of those trajectories.

But in my opinion,

it's always good to get
some real world experience

before you keep going with your education

because it just makes it easier

to figure out what exactly you want.

- [Daisy] Yes, absolutely.

And I think that that having
that experience made me learn

a lot of things about
what I do and don't want

in a workplace and where I think that,

that my work can be the most impactful.

- [Mary] And of course,
what you enjoy the most.

- [Daisy] Right, yes, also that.

Yeah.

- [Mary] So how has the pandemic
affected your trajectory?

- [Daisy] So mostly,
it's really just changed

the specifics of my research.

But overall, I actually haven't
been too affected I think,

except for just the
acceleration of my trajectory.

So as a member of the TenOever Lab

at the Icahn School of Medicine,

I was really studying

on like the antiviral innate
immune response in general,

like just doing basic science research.

And I was also doing a
lot of mouse work using

for a viral engineering project.

And so basically when on
the pandemic happened,

those were the two things
that I was studying.

And very specifically, it
positioned me in a unique way

to just transition all of the skills

that I had learned doing on

like in terms of understanding
the antiviral immune response

and being able to do small animal work.

I could use both of those to transition

to understanding the host response

to SARS-CoV-2 in a small animal model.

And so, it really was a kind of chance

that it just allowed
me to take those things

that I'd already been
studying and use them there.

And then definitely the past year

has just been really accelerated.

So just a lot of a few years
just kind of smushed into one.

But my trajectory has
really stayed the same

because I'm intending on
continuing in academia,

and after defending my thesis,

I'm starting a postdoctoral position.

- [Mary] So what was it
like as a doctoral candidate

at your level when the
pandemic first started?

- [Daisy] It really felt
like I was in a movie.

Like it felt like I was in specific yeah,

specifically in the field of virology.

I was a second year

in the middle of the
second year of my PhD,

so essentially that just means
that the entire trajectory

of my PhD is still yet to be determined

because there's still
several years left in theory.

But I was acquainted with
the lab that I worked in.

Like I knew how to do assays,

I knew how to run certain experiments.

So I had this whole opportunity

of what the rest of my
PhD could look like.

And then, when the pandemic happened

and you are virologist at a
massive virology department

at the epicenter of the pandemic,

with a PI who is getting very involved

in SARS-CoV-2 research immediately,

and there was a BSL-3 just
right down the hall from you,

it felt really, really surreal.

It's still kind of does, honestly.

- [Mary] Yeah.

I mean I think it felt pretty surreal

for just about everybody
in the entire world.

But I can imagine being
kind of right in the thick

of that sort of base level science

where everything is just kind
of definitely taking off.

I mean we knew so little in the beginning

that did it kind of feel
like the whole world

was like looking to you and
your peers for some information?

- [Daisy] Yeah, absolutely.

It was, I think that that's
part of what drove me

to be able to get so much done,

especially in the first year
of everything happening,

that just the thought that
something that I could do,

not that any of us think
that we're going to somehow

by ourselves understand
SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19,

but to be one tiny,
tiny piece of the puzzle

of contributing to our understanding

of the virus or the disease was definitely

a motivating factor that got
me through a lot of long days.

- [Mary] Yeah.

So how long did it take for your lab

to shift to mainly COVID work?

- [Daisy] It was actually
pretty immediate.

So the first two weeks of
March were relatively normal.

The second week of March

is when everything started to shut down.

But I actually, I got COVID that week.

- [Mary] Oh no.

- [Daisy] Yeah.

So I basically, I only knew this.

I didn't have severe COVID
or anything like that.

It was a very mild case.

But basically I had a cough for a day,

and then I had a headache
for several days after that.

And we realized that it
probably had to be COVID.

And then later on I was tested
zero positive for SARS-CoV-2.

So basically I self-isolated

for a week at the very
beginning of the pandemic.

- [Mary] Oh.

- [Daisy] Yeah.

But that week was when my
lab entirely transitioned

to SARS-CoV-2 work.

So I came back and it was
just full, full force.

So essentially, like two weeks
before the lockdown happened,

a postdoc in our lab

and a different graduate
student started getting trained

in the BSL-3 facility

because no one in our lab
had done BSL-3 work before,

even though it was just down the hall,

because primarily the (mumbles) facility

at Mount Sinai was used for
West Nile and Hantavirus work.

And so, they were starting to get trained.

But then by the time I got back,

everyone was working just around the clock

on analyzing samples,

and everyone was doing everything
in conjunction together

for several weeks while
we were really focusing

on the first manuscript that
came out of the TenOever Lab

in April of last year.

And we were all just working
together to get it done.

So it was very immediate.

But the transition was a
little bit starker for me

because I left lab and
then came back a week later

and the transition had
just entirely happened.

- [Mary] Yeah. Oh gosh.

So if anyone listening
hasn't heard the term,

BSL-3 labs are those that are using

or researching dangerous viruses.

The only higher level is BSL-4.

I'm not sure what BSL-4 specifically does,

but I'm assuming things like Ebola.

- [Daisy] Yes, that's exactly right.

(Mary mumbles)

Yeah. Ebola.

I think some nipah
viruses are BSL-4 as well.

So some emerging viral pathogens

if you do them in animals
are also in BSL-4 as well.

- [Mary] Yeah.

So can you tell me about some
of these specific research

you've done on COVID?

- [Daisy] Yeah, absolutely.

So there are a lot of
different collaborations

that I've worked on,

but mainly the work that I've done

over the course of the past 15 months now,

I guess, is defining hamsters,

the hamster model of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

So for anybody who doesn't know,

the reason that we have to use hamsters

for SARS-CoV-2 is because the
original circulating strain

of SARS-CoV-2 does not
naturally infect mice,

which would of course be
the go-to animal model

on for in a lab to study
any sort of disease.

And so, of course there are
lots of ways to overcome

the fact that they can't become
infected with SARS-CoV-2,

because you can introduce
exogenous host receptors

that will allow the mice to be infected,

but it gets a little bit tricky

when you're really want to study

like things like tissue
tropism and the host response,

and you actually want to make sure

that everything is exactly
endogenously expressed.

So the smallest animal

that it became apparent does get infected

with SARS-CoV-2 is the
Syrian golden hamster.

So we essentially this guys are about

like five time bigger than a BALB/c mouse

when they're about five weeks old.

And you can put two in a cage

and essentially no
hamsters had ever been used

at Mount Sinai before,

so we just had to define the
hamster model to SARS-CoV-2,

and just figure out how to
work with hamsters in general.

- [Mary] Right.

Yeah.

I'm just wondering, like you said,

Sinai hadn't had hamsters previously.

Do you happen to know how they figured out

that hamsters could contract COVID?

And I believe they even express
symptoms similar to humans,

like for example, respiratory
infections, things like that.

- [Daisy] Yeah, absolutely.

So there's a lot of early work done

by Yoshi Kawaoka's laboratory

in Japan that did a lot of
defining of the animal model.

They had a paper that was
published pretty early on,

I think in June in PNAS,
looking at hamsters.

But besides that, we knew
that because hamsters

could be infected with SARS-CoV-1,

like the original SARS-CoV strain,

so people knew to turn to
hamsters when this happened.

- [Mary] Yeah.

What were some of the other research tools

that you've used besides hamsters?

- [Daisy] Yeah.

Really I think the most exciting thing

about this past year scientifically for me

is that there's just
this massive convergence

of different research disciplines

and it allowed the possibility

for a lot of interdisciplinary work.

So because everyone switched their focus,

even people who didn't study
microbiology or at all,

wanted to pull resources together

to see how we could study the virus using

how they study science.

So there was room for a lot
of collaboration with people

who use things like
IPSC-derived organoid models.

So looking on in vitro at cells
that they're able to induce

to actually resemble
different parts of organs

like alveolar organoids, cardiomyocytes,

neurons, intestinal organoids,

with several different research groups.

The work that I did surrounding

that was with the Brennand's laboratory

at the Icahn School of
Medicine at Mount Sinai.

So there's a lot of room

for interdisciplinary collaborations.

As well, there was even room

for collaboration with computational labs.

Professor Avi Ma'ayan, who's
also at the Icahn School

of Medicine at Mount Sinai
did an in silico drug

using sequencing data.

And then I was able to lead
the collaboration from our side

and test those drugs using
that they were able to predict,

using their own computational
prediction background,

as well as different
sorts of collaborations

with people that study
things like anosmia,

for example, with collaborators

from the New York Genome Center.

So really I think that the
most interesting things

in terms of tools is just the fact that

I think we learned a lot about how tools

from different disciplines
can be used together

to really delineate some impactful things.

- [Mary] This is a little bit off topic,

but I kind of feel like maybe the only,

or one of the only silver linings

to COVID was us all
discovering how relatively easy

it is with technology to
collaborate with people

who are at a distance from you.

I mean that kind of became the norm.

Do you feel like you, it
sounds like you've discovered

that collaboration has kind
of ramped up during COVID.

- [Daisy] Yeah, it definitely has for us.

I can't speak for everyone

because everybody has
a different experience.

And I know I'm also talking
about this as somebody

who is a virologist.

But yeah, it definitely has.

And I think that that,
going back to the aspect

of my trajectory and training,

has given me a lot of opportunities

to see how different people
from different fields think

about different questions

and given me a chance
to be able to explain

from a virologist perspective

how I would plan this experiment

or why we need to look at this,

which I think has been
a really valuable lesson

and learning exercise as well

that we can do and in real life.

And I think that also
in terms of the science

that the SARS-CoV-2
research has brought about,

I think a lot of the things we're learning

about do have a lot to do
with probably many viruses.

But the fact that we
can study these things

on such a large scale with so
many people looking at them

is just allowing us to
uncover things about viruses

and the immune response

that really just wouldn't
be possible to study

without so many people working
on them at the same time,

and also having like human data,

in vivo data and in vitro
data to learn these things

all at the same time
with all of this funding

and people working together
to solve a problem.

- [Mary] Yeah, absolutely.

But speaking of your trajectory,

has this focus on COVID
your original career goals,

or do you feel like you're
still kind of on the same track?

- [Daisy] Yeah, I'm still
on the same track I think.

I think that I went into my PhD,

not knowing necessarily
whether I wanted to continue on

in academia or move to industry

or move to something else as well.

But I always was
open-minded to everything.

I personally know that I'm going to stay

on the academic track right now,

but I also know that for a lot
of people that it has changed

because of a lot of things.

But I also think that
specifically I'm surrounded

by all of these people
who are in virology.

And now, of course, there are
a lot of new virology jobs

that are opening up in industry.

- [Mary] Yeah.

- [Daisy] So I think that
that can be appealing

to a lot of people.

And I know a lot of people
whose intentional paths

have changed because of
the pandemic as well.

- [Mary] Yeah.

That makes sense.

Can you expand in your opinion,

what has the pandemic meant

for other early career researchers

like yourself in this field?

Like what can you say from the ground

in terms of what your
friends are planning to do?

- [Daisy] Yeah.

So I think that it's meant
a lot of different things

to a lot of different people,

specifically depending on their situation

and their ability to adjust

because of things that
don't necessarily have

to do with science,

but just the things that they have to deal

with in their life, like
during the course of a pandemic

that allowed them to like
focus on science or not.

Like for example, I can't
imagine if I had children

and this pandemic happened,

and there are a lot of PhD
students who do have children,

and trying to make this transition

to do all of this research,

I absolutely would not have been able to.

And I think as well, if
you have family members

who are frontline workers
and you're constantly

and also have at risk on comorbidities

for COVID-19 the past year,

and you're constantly
worrying about your family,

and of course those
worries are even greater

specifically in communities of color.

- [Mary] Yeah.

- [Daisy] I think that
for a lot of reasons,

I was privileged enough to
be able to take advantage

of this opportunity in a way
that a lot of other people

in different situations
wouldn't have been able to

because of the toll that
this pandemic has taken

on how a lot of people live their lives.

So I think that it's meant a
lot of heterogeneous things

for different people.

I think that the opportunity

specifically in the field of virology,

there's definitely a lot more now

because everyone's worried
about the next pandemic

and how the next pandemic
is going to happen.

So there's a lot of virology research,

which is a really exciting time.

But I think that each
individual has definitely

had their own experience.

- [Mary] Yeah, that's definitely true,

I mean especially considering
it's not as if COVID

was the only thing happening in the world

over the past year and a
half if only it had been.

- [Daisy] Right.

- [Mary] A lot of other things

have been going on globally since 2019.

- [Daisy] Yes, that's true.

- [Mary] And before and forever.

But if nothing else,

and it brings more attention to virology

and to how easily these sort
of pandemics can happen,

I feel like that's good
knowledge for us to have.

And the more science that
can be done around it,

obviously the better.

- [Daisy] Yeah, absolutely.

- [Mary] Well, thank you so
much for joining us, Daisy.

We really appreciate hearing perspective

from a researcher who's
right in the thick of things.

- [Mary] Thank you so much for having me.

(upbeat music)