Research is itself an educational activity. With the laws of science and nature for teachers, researchers conduct experiments to learn how life and the world work. 黑料吃瓜资源 (CSHL) is world-renowned for breakthrough bioscience research. What many outside the scientific community might not realize is that the Laboratory was founded as an educational institute. That was all the way back in 1890. Over the following century, , 黑料吃瓜资源 Press, and helped to cement the Laboratory鈥檚 reputation as a leader in sharing scientific knowledge.
In 1999, CSHL made it official with the launch of an innovative graduate school program, the CSHL School of Biological Sciences (SBS). The program immerses students in the labs of CSHL faculty members, where they conduct cutting-edge experiments and interact with visiting scientists and collaborators from around the world. Today, SBS graduates are leaders in research, academia, and industry. Some run basic biology labs of their own. Others help bring new medicines to doctors and patients. Their accomplishments reflect the wide range of experiences and opportunities available to SBS students. To celebrate the School鈥檚 25th anniversary, we spoke with five graduates about their time at CSHL and what they鈥檝e been up to in the years since. Here are their stories.
Seeding excellence: Plant biologist Michelle Heck
Michelle Heck first caught the biology bug as a high schooler in New Hyde Park, NY. It happened during a visit to CSHL鈥檚 Dolan DNA Learning Center. Even decades later, Heck recalls the hands-on experiment she conducted to cut and separate viral DNA. 鈥淲hen I saw that we could actually look at DNA, there was a part of me that became hooked,鈥� she says.
After earning her bachelor鈥檚 degree at Boston University, Heck returned to Long Island to complete her Ph.D. at the SBS. Here, she joined Professor David Jackson鈥檚 lab, which studies genes and signals in cells that regulate plant growth and shape. She looks back on her homecoming with fond memories:
鈥淚 was excited to come back and be a part of the Cold Spring Harbor environment. If you go there, the place is like one extended science camp. It鈥檚 heaven on Earth for people who love to do science.鈥�
For her thesis, Heck conducted the first-ever genetic screen to uncover genes that regulate how plant cells communicate. 鈥淚t was so thrilling to be a part of that discovery and to have that knowledge that no one else on Earth knew,鈥� she says.
Heck became interested in disease when Jackson introduced her to a plant virologist. She was fascinated by how viral proteins hijack the pathways plant cells normally use to communicate. Today, she works to expand our knowledge of plant viruses and bacterial diseases spread by insects, and she uses this information to help farmers develop new agricultural management tools. For one, she is the co-inventor of a new biotechnology called Symbiont, which allows therapeutic molecules to be delivered directly into trees.
The fatal citrus greening disease has decimated groves across Florida. Heck is carving out new solutions at the USDA. 鈥淚nterestingly,鈥� she says, 鈥渨e鈥檙e now using the discovery that I made as a grad student鈥攖his particular gene that I discovered in my screen鈥攖o help optimize the Symbiont technology we developed.鈥�
Heck鈥檚 lab is located at Cornell University, so she also has an appointment as an adjunct professor of plant pathology and plant-microbe biology. 鈥淭hrough my role at Cornell, I am able to mentor graduate students, undergraduates, and postdocs,鈥� she says. Many of the lessons she passes along were informed by her time at CSHL:
鈥淐old Spring Harbor scientists are pushing the boundaries of their fields, and that has shaped the scientist I鈥檝e become. I am not afraid to think big. I鈥檓 not afraid to fail. I want my science to push the boundaries of knowledge. And it helps me develop a rigorous research program where people know that we strive for excellence.鈥�
Sharing knowledge: Journal editor Darren Burgess
Rigor and a commitment to excellence are qualities that all universities look for in students. Of course, that doesn鈥檛 mean these qualities only translate to academic success.
After finishing his master鈥檚 studies at the University of Oxford in England, Darren Burgess found himself at a crossroads. He knew he wanted to pursue a Ph.D. but wasn鈥檛 quite sure where. The choice came down to whether he would stay in the U.K. or move to the U.S. to enroll at CSHL.
He recalls his thought process at the time:
鈥淚n terms of the atmosphere, I really felt Cold Spring Harbor had an edge. Everyone was very welcoming, very smart. But they’re also very keen to be the best right now.”
In their first year at the SBS, students rotate through laboratories before deciding which one to join. Burgess landed in then-CSHL Professor Scott Lowe鈥檚 lab. His research focused on developing new screens to better understand chemotherapy resistance in cancer. However, once he received his Ph.D. in 2007, Burgess stepped out of the lab and into the world of science communication.
Burgess joined the Nature staff in 2010, initially working for Nature Reviews Genetics and Nature Reviews Cancer. In 2023, he became a senior editor at Nature, handling manuscripts in biotechnology, genomics, and clinical research. He now reviews about 20 new manuscripts per week. He then arranges for those articles to be peer-reviewed by other scientists and oversees the manuscripts as they go through multiple rounds of revisions before they are officially accepted for publication. In addition to reviewing manuscripts, he does 鈥渜uite a lot of outreach鈥� to ensure the best research is submitted.
Academic researchers often find that their careers are measured by how many papers they鈥檝e published and in which journals. So, emotions can run high during the publication process. Interacting with researchers requires tact, diplomacy, and the certainty that one鈥檚 decisions are based on 鈥渟olid science,鈥� Burgess says. 鈥淥ur decisions have a big impact on people鈥檚 careers, so we need to make sure we鈥檙e thoroughly professional, robust, and consistent in the way we make those decisions.鈥�
Even decades later, Burgess says he still benefits from the skills and 鈥渁pproach to life鈥� he learned while enrolled in CSHL鈥檚 Ph.D. program:
鈥淐old Spring Harbor is the sort of environment where you learn not to be intimidated by people鈥檚 job titles, success, stature, or influence, because everyone is a scientist, everyone’s interested, and everyone鈥檚 human. It鈥檚 also taught me very high standards. At Cold Spring Harbor, they don鈥檛 settle for second best. They want everything to be the best. And that鈥檚 very similar to what we strive for.鈥�
Bridging bench to bedside: Pharma leader Cathy Seiler
Over the course of her career, Cathy Seiler has jumped between several industries. She鈥檚 worked in academia, managed a biobank in a hospital, and led groups at biotech businesses. Now, she supports translational medicine and cancer research at one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies.
Seiler and Burgess were classmates at the SBS. And like him, she remembers feeling drawn to CSHL鈥檚 unique intellectual atmosphere where everyone is excited about the latest cutting-edge science. Seiler recalls:
鈥淚t really is all-encompassing and all-consuming. I loved the idea of the program. I loved the idea that you were going to learn how to think. You were going to learn how to question. You were going to learn how to learn.鈥�
Seiler joined the SBS in 2001 and conducted her thesis research in then-CSHL Professor Yuri Lazebnik鈥檚 laboratory, which studied how cancer cells evolve and can be selectively killed. Seiler focused on how certain enzymes are activated during programmed cell death. However, throughout the course of the program, she began to think about pursuing other avenues. Along with a thesis advisor, SBS students are paired with an academic mentor who provides additional support. Seiler鈥檚 was David Stewart, the executive director of CSHL鈥檚 Meetings & Courses Program. Seiler says the pairing was 鈥渞eally well-placed,鈥� as it allowed her to visualize a career path that didn鈥檛 end in a lab.
During the program, students share their research with other scientists and learn how to evaluate studies outside their areas of expertise. Seiler sought out more opportunities to further hone her communication skills, like writing for CSHL鈥檚 Harbor Transcript magazine and conducting interviews at the Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology. Today, sharing research findings with the public is a big part of her job, but it鈥檚 not just about communication. It鈥檚 about improving people鈥檚 lives.
Seiler joined AstraZeneca in 2022 as director of operational excellence in translational medicine in oncology research and development. AstraZeneca researches, develops, and manufactures prescription drugs for cancer and rare diseases, among other conditions. The company produces nearly 40 medications available to patients in the U.S.
Earlier this year, Seiler began a new role as business planning and operations lead supporting translational medicine in oncology. Working in translational medicine, she helps the company bridge the gap between basic research and patient treatments. One of her main duties is helping manage a multimillion-dollar budget for a department of over 160 people. Seiler credits CSHL with teaching her how to quickly pick up new skills, like overseeing large budgets or using new technologies:
鈥淚 know that I can go in there, and I can learn it. I think that鈥檚 allowed me to be more confident in taking risks in my career.鈥�
Championing research: Preclinical powerhouse Rebecca Bish
One thing students learn quickly at CSHL is the importance of private funding. Private grants and fellowships are major sources of funding not only for the labs in which the students work but also for Ph.D. student salaries. CSHL is a private nonprofit institution. And while Becky Bish might not have known it when she graduated, she would eventually bring her extensive cancer research experience back to the nonprofit world.
Today, Bish is the head of discovery and preclinical research at The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research, a nonprofit that funds basic and translational cancer research. In this role, she identifies research that could have a big impact on patients yet is difficult to fund through traditional sources. She explains:
鈥淢aybe it鈥檚 a little bit too out there and needs some more preliminary data before the government would be willing to fund it. Or it鈥檚 too far away from direct clinical impact for a pharma company to fund it. So, we try to identify those gaps, step in, accelerate the findings that scientists make in the lab, and get them to cancer patients faster.鈥�
After graduating from MIT with a bachelor’s degree in biology, Bish joined then-Professor Michael Myers鈥� lab at CSHL. Her thesis focused on studying proteins in a cell, seeing how they interact in different disease states, and identifying findings that could be applied to diagnosing or treating cancer. Bish went on to conduct research at New York University and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. During this time, she also founded a company that offered scientific editing for life sciences research. She then worked with a computational biochemistry research company before joining the Mark Foundation in 2017.
In her role at the Mark Foundation, Bish reads through hundreds of researchers鈥� grant proposals each year and helps decide which scientists should receive funding. In the seven years Bish has been with the foundation, it has awarded $230 million in grants and funded eight different startups. The nonprofit currently funds research at more than 100 institutions in 16 countries.
Bish says she uses the skills she learned at CSHL daily, especially 鈥渢he ability to quickly and rigorously evaluate scientific output.鈥� She says CSHL鈥檚 atmosphere of open collaboration helped her learn to take criticism well and communicate her own criticism clearly to others:
鈥淵ou have to be flexible and willing to say, 鈥楴o, I was wrong. I have to go in a completely different direction now.鈥� And it doesn鈥檛 matter who points that out to you. The data are what they are, and that sort of humility and flexibility is key to being a good scientist.鈥�
Inspiring innovation: Entrepreneur Yaniv Erlich
The ability to go off in new directions is also invaluable when changing careers, like when CSHL graduate Yaniv Erlich left academia to pursue his dream of starting his own company. He鈥檚 now the CEO and co-founder of multimillion-dollar biotechnology startup Eleven Therapeutics. The company uses 鈥渘ext generation鈥� RNA molecules called xRNA to silence disease-causing genes.
Erlich was drawn to the SBS in part because of its small community, where, as an international student, he felt he would be well taken care of. He completed his thesis in then-CSHL Professor 鈥嬧�婫reg Hannon鈥檚 lab, which focused on developing tools and strategies for manipulating gene expression. There, Erlich devised a method that allows researchers to sequence thousands of DNA samples at once. 鈥淲e call it DNA Sudoku because it’s like solving a puzzle,鈥� he explains. 鈥淵ou have a few sets of cells that are assigned, and then you can go and complete everything.鈥�
After completing his Ph.D., Erlich moved to the Whitehead Institute at MIT, where he started his own lab. During his time there, he published several high-profile studies, including a paper in Science suggesting the identities of anonymous participants in research studies could be recovered by analyzing Y chromosomes. However, after authoring over 50 peer-reviewed papers and patents, Erlich was ready to try something else. He worked for three years as chief science officer for the genealogy company MyHeritage before deciding to set out on his own.
In 2020, Erlich founded Eleven Therapeutics with his mentor, Greg Hannon. The company uses artificial intelligence and biochemistry to create new, specially modified messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules. In recent years, mRNA vaccines have become extremely popular, but the technology has built-in limitations, Erlich says:
鈥淚f you want to create drugs for chronic treatments, you want to have long-lasting expression of your therapeutic protein or peptide. An RNA molecule is pretty bad for that because it enters into the cells and breaks quite rapidly. We developed chemical strategies that make these molecules much more stable by introducing chemical modifications to the molecule.”
In the company鈥檚 early stages, Erlich did much of the science himself. He even coded its first website. Now, his role has switched to managing a team and considering the company’s future.
Erlich says his time at Cold Spring Harbor taught him 鈥渟o many things鈥� he still uses in his career today, including how to recover from failure and communicate with other scientists. Moreover, it taught him to be both bold and humble:
鈥淵ou can try new things. You can do something crazy and inspiring and take high risks. And it will reward you. Greg used to ideate this type of approach, and I think I learned that as well.鈥�
25 years of insight and innovation
The five stories above offer a glimpse at the many different paths SBS graduates may take after leaving Cold Spring Harbor. They also illustrate some of the things that set the SBS apart from other graduate schools. However, it鈥檚 important to keep in mind that these are the stories of just five of 156 students who have received a Ph.D. from the SBS since 1999.
A current list of graduates includes professors at Yale and Cambridge University. Others have positions at leading technology companies Amazon and Meta. Others still have found their way back to Cold Spring Harbor. Arkarup Banerjee (class of 2016) is an assistant professor studying neuroscience at CSHL. Zachary Lippman (class of 2005) is a professor and HHMI investigator studying plant biology. As CSHL Director of Graduate Studies, he鈥檚 also the head of the SBS.
No two students鈥� stories are the same. However, in each case, the CSHL School of Biological Sciences has offered its graduates the experiences needed to help them better understand life and the world. They pay these opportunities forward every day, improving lives around the planet and making the world a better place for all of us.
Written by: Margaret Osborne, Science Writer | [email protected] | 516-367-8455