Highlights
Student Profile: Marguerite Matthews
Destiny and fate are concepts that scientists might skeptically raise their eyebrows over. But Marguerite Matthews, a PhD student in the Department of Neuroscience in the University of Pittsburgh School of Arts and Sciences, is happy to admit that her scientific career to date has most definitely been influenced by these very un-scientific factors. The K. Leroy Irvis Fellow, who received her undergraduate degree in biochemistry from Spelman College, recalls that it was a single conversation during her junior year of high school that set her on the path toward what she hopes will be a life in academia.
"My high school chemistry teacher suggested that I apply for a summer internship at The Salk Institute of Biological Sciences. Until he mentioned it, I had no idea the internship even existed," says Matthews.
What Matthews did not realize at the time, was that the particular lab that was looking for an intern—the Gage Laboratory of Genetics—was one of the nation's premier laboratories studying neurogenesis. She applied, got the internship, and ended up meeting one of the most influential people in her life—Henriette van Praag.
"I couldn't have gotten a better mentor," she says. "Over the years we've become friends. And now we're colleagues."
For Matthews, the internship was a watershed experience in more ways than that one. "From the moment I started my first set of experiments, I felt a sense of purpose in the laboratory setting, and was determined to make a home for myself in the big world of science."
And make a home she did. Almost literally. At the end of the summer, what was supposed to be a 10-week internship evolved into an after-school job, which then took over the weekends, and ended up lasting for two years.
"It got to the point where I had so much experience that graduate students would be asking me the proper way to do certain procedures," laughs Matthews. "I was the'go to' girl for histology."
Certain that she wanted to pursue a career in the sciences, but not yet sure what shape that career would take, she attended Spelman College in Atlanta, and it was during those years that she discovered one of her other great interests—teaching.
Offers Matthews, "I was a teaching assistant in the Department of Chemistry, and it was such a powerful experience to work with students and to see them understand something—to open their eyes to something that they may not have seen before. I take it as a great honor to be able to teach someone else."
As she was moving toward the end of her undergraduate studies, Matthews had not yet made up her mind about next steps.
"I was considering medical school, or maybe an MD/PhD program, but I wasn't sure."
Destiny intervened once again when a professor of hers passed along her name to a colleague at Carnegie Mellon University. That colleague, in turn, contacted Matthews. It was during her studies in biological sciences at Carnegie Mellon that she had the opportunity to meet and work with the person who would become the second great mentor in her life: University of Pitt Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience Bita Moghaddam. After a year, Matthews left Carnegie Mellon to come to Pitt, where Moghaddam is her advisor.
Matthews admits that women pursuing careers in the sciences face unique hurdles but she cites the examples and achievements of her mentors as proof that it is quite possible for women to succeed in what is typically considered to be a "man's world."
"They have allowed me to see that you can't not do something because of your gender or because of anything else. They are very different people with very different approaches in the world, but they both let the science speak for itself," says Matthews.
Though the Irvis Fellowship provides recipients with an exemption from teaching responsibilities, Matthews is currently teaching the recitation for "Brain and Behavior" in the neuroscience department.
"Most of the people who have been the biggest influences in my life have been teachers who've taken the time to get to know me, understand my personal struggles, and help me get over them," Matthews says. "Having someone who really cares about your success is so important, and it's really important for me to be able to give back in that way."
