November 2010 Scientist of the Month: Sacha Patera
By Eunji Chung
Sacha Patera is the Associate Director at the Office of Corporate Relations at Northwestern University. Dr. Patera connects corporate funding with scientific needs, focusing primarily on linking faculty members in the areas of physical and life sciences, technology, engineering and math to companies involved in pharmaceutical, biotechnology, technology and engineering efforts.
Born in Prague but a native of Canada, Sacha graduated from McGill University with a B.S. in Biochemistry and later received her Ph.D. in the Chemistry department at Brandeis University. It wasn’t a surprise that Sacha decided to pursue a doctoral degree; both her mother and father, grandmother and grandfather all received Ph.D.’s in various disciplines including physics, Russian literature, and math. In fact, the academic track was all she knew: her mother is a retired professor at McGill University and her father is a professor at the University of Montreal.
With her scholastic and educational pedigree, Sacha was aware that monetary and capital gains were not her motivational roots. Her current position at Northwestern speaks of her passion for linking the right connections and her understanding of the importance of intentional collaboration. Sacha understands that in many cases, the whole is greater than the sum of the individual parts. And so, between undergraduate and graduate schools, Sacha jumped at the chance to work with Payloads Systems (Cambridge, MA) on a protein crystallization experiment in space. At the time, NASA was still recovering from the Challenger accident and shuttle flight schedules were uncertain. Using the Russian space station MIR seemed the most viable option for this experiment. With Sacha’s biochemistry background and her fluency in Russian, she was the right link to come onboard. The project entailed collaboration with Greg Petsko’s crystallography group to grow crystals in space in an attempt to assess the effects of gravity on crystal growth. While the first mission in December 1989 was a success on many levels, subsequent missions had to be curtailed due to the fall of the USSR in 1991.
In 1989, Greg Petsko’s move to Brandeis University motivated Sacha to pursue a graduate degree there. Once at Brandeis, Sacha became unexpectedly intrigued with protein structure determination using NMR spectroscopy. Specifically, her thesis determined the structure of the active site loop of serpins (serine protease inhibitors) in the laboratory of Dr. Thomas Pochapsky. However, near the end of her graduate career, after attending a conference to find another investigator cracking the code to the same project, Sacha found herself somewhat deflated. As she was finishing her studies, Sacha met her husband and relocated to Chicago where she began post-doctoral work in crystallography with Dr. Alfonso Mondragon. When she started having children, Sacha was then faced with the issue of time management. Flexibility to be with her children became an imminent need, and after two years as a post-doc and four as a research associate in two different labs, Sacha realized that she was no longer happy doing bench work. It did not allow her to thrive the way she wanted to.
Though the decision to leave was very difficult, Sacha felt relief as well. On one hand, she felt she was disappointing her PI, her colleagues, parents, friends, and all professional women, and on another hand, she felt this was the beginning of the right path. Sacha stayed involved in science by teaching biochemistry and immunology courses at Northwestern’s School of Continuing Studies before becoming the Assistant Director of the Interdepartmental Biological Sciences Graduate Program (IBiS).
Before her decision to leave the lab, she says she hadn’t formulated what she wanted to do. It took soul searching and self-assessment for Sacha to honestly admit that her scientific talents were best served outside of the lab. That’s when she understood that she was an excellent go-between liaison between the “lay public and scientific community.” In many ways, her role in the IBiS program was just that. She reflects back on her time with IBiS as an incredibly rewarding experience as she facilitated discussion among students, faculty, and administration, participated in graduate education programming development and witnessed students coming into their own as they rose to their next step.
The time with IBiS was a period of tremendous growth for Sacha both personally and professionally. Her move to the Office of Corporate Relations was also motivated by the potential for growth and learning in a new area of University administration. While she can’t predict what her next move will be, she is excited about the professional opportunities that lie ahead.
Sacha considers herself lucky to have had mentors from all areas of the University who helped her appreciate her values, bring back self-confidence, and reaffirm her talents. She emphasizes that “all paths are valuable, not just academic paths,” and encourages everyone to seek out mentors who may or may not be your PI, and make the most of University career resources. Not all mentors have to come from the world of science. For example, Yvette Davis, Business Administrator of the Life Sciences Financial Services at Northwestern, has also been very significant in Sacha’s professional development.
To the AWIS audience, Sacha advises to “be honest with yourself about what it is you want for yourself out of life, personally and professionally. Don’t do something because that’s what someone else thinks you should do. Ask yourself what do you want to do? When you have a terminal degree, you have to trust that there are many options out there for you, with the academic path being the only one that is well charted. It’s like what Dr. Alicia Löffler said at the AWIS dinner last year. Don’t be afraid to take a chance and jump from the comfort of this lily pad to the next one. And if the place that you land is not all that you thought it would be, learn what you can jump again. You will learn something with each jump and will be changed with each experience. But all of this happens only after you are honest with yourself – and optimistic.”
As a student in the IBIS program, I had the opportunity and privilege to be recruited by Sacha and form a friendship with her throughout my graduate studies. Sacha was always cheerful, willing, and persevering—rewards that come from someone, like her words above, who is honest with herself and the world around her.
Eunji is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Dr. Guillermo Ameer’s lab at Northwestern Unviersity. Her thesis consists of fabricating various biodegradable grafts for orthopaedic applications. After graduation, she will move on to her post doctoral fellowship with Dr. Ramille Shah at Northwestern University and hopes to be a professor committed to both research and teaching.
*Know a scientist you think should be featured in an upcoming “Scientist of the Month” article? Submit your nomination here. Your nominee does not need to be an AWIS member or a woman, but should promote the advancement of women in science, technology, mathematics and engineering.
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