教授简介：
Hiroaki Matsunami, PhD，Associate Professor
Program: Molecular Genetics & microbiology
field of research:molecular mechanisms underlying chemosensation (taste and smell) in mammals.
Introductory page: http://mgm.duke.edu/faculty/matsunami/index.htm
Homepage: http://www.duke.edu/web/matsunamilab/index.html
编者：康东，Molecular Genetics and Microbiology，PHD
DCSSA: As my first question, you are a Japanese researcher who graduated from Kyoto University, one of the most prestigious researching institutes in Japan. Could you tell me a little about your Ph.D. project and how your Ph.D. life shaped your future career?
Hiroaki: the lab in which I was was basically a lab in which everybody studied cell adhesion molecules, because the professor discovered the molecules. And all of us were researching on different aspects of cell adhesion molecules. I, myself, studies cadherins in brain development, but others were researching on cadherins in cancers or how they are regulated. At the time when I started my project, it became apparent that there are more cell adhesion molecules than we expected previously; there were only 3 or 4 cadherins identified previous and we discovered that there are actually many more-many of them of expressed in the brain. So my jobs is to identify which cadherins are expressed in the brain. I should it is not my own project; I collaborated with a lot of other people, because there are many family members of cadherins. Through our project, it became apparent that there was a cadherin called N-cadherin which is expressed in all of the neurons; other cadherins are expressed differentially in brains. One of the cadherins I focused on is retinal cadherins which is also expressed in the brain and is only expressed in a specific region of the brain. I was basically mapping the expression area, and what is found that it correspond well to the anatomical domain called neuromir; basically this region responds to the future of brain areas such as forebrain and hindbrains. So that made me feel that because cadherins are known to have the homo-philic interactions, the same member of cadherins attracts each other but not others. Because they are expressed in different domains, maybe these molecules attribute to the formation of different brain areas.
DCSSA: so at the moment your lab was not a neural lab.
Hiroaki: it was not a neural lab. It was more like a cell developmental biology.
DCSSA: You did your post-doc in Buck’s lab in the field of olfaction. Could you tell me why you make such change?
Hiroaki: So you may think it is a big change, but it is not actually a big change. All the techniques you used, how you think about things are the same. So what happened is this: when I approached my last year of Ph.D. and began to think what I wanted to do, it was natural for me to continue research—meaning doing post-docs was good. The question became to what I study, right? The first thing was that I want to something I really interested in; the second thing was that I don’t want to do the same thing. On the other hand, I was not sure I can switch COMPLETELY. So the thought was that I can use the technique or background knowledge or logical thinking in the new place, yet I will be in a different field. So what I did was did: in my career as a graduate student I had a stack of papers that I read and I basically categorized them into “very interesting” and “not so really interesting”. And looking at the papers I classified as “very interesting”, I found that one of them was olfaction and another was axon path-finding. So why was olfaction interesting to me? The initial paper published by Buck who received Nobel Prize later was published in 1991, which was very interesting and new. And one or two years later, more papers were published from the same lab and two things emerged: each neuron seems to express a single receptor gene, although there are hundreds of neural receptor genes you can find (at the time there was no genome information, the reason they say there are many gene was because they can clone many genes); another thing is that although all the olfaction neurons send axons to olfactory balls, the neurons with the same neural receptor gene send axons to the same olfactory spot in the brain. So the hundreds of neural receptor genes will convert to hundreds of receptor spots. That is very cool and I wonder how that kind of thing can be regulated as to how a neuron can choose a gene from hundreds of receptor genes and how a neuron can choose a target spot from hundreds of potential space. I thought it was really interesting and I thought there must be something that I can do.
DCSSA: Before we talk about your post-doc life in Harvard University, I would like to ask more about your education. As a Japanese PI in the United States, you definitely underwent both American and Japanese education. How do you compare them?
Hiroaki: At the graduate level, the differences are: first, there is no rotation in Japanese education. So you just have to choose which lab should go to, and before that is that the majority of Japanese undergraduate student will go to the lab in the same school. In the US, people tend to go to another school. So that is a big difference. So because there is no rotation system in Japan, it is really hard for students to go to another school because they don’t whether a lab is good or not. So these two are actually related but this is a big difference. Another difference is the graduate education. Here they offer a lot more graduate courses than Japan. In Japan, students only take one or two courses and that is it; and all the rest is you stay in the lab. So that is a big difference. The third difference is that in the US there is always a boss and then there are students and post-docs. In japan, there is a big boss, a middle boss and a small boss and there are senior graduate students and then you. So it is quite different how you feel like. Basically what you want to do here is to keep a good relationship with your boss, but in Japan, you have to make sure that all your senior colleagues are happy with you. Another difference in Japan is that you have more chances to go out to drink. Here, if you like you can go out for a drink, but I guess the custom of regular lab activity (going for a drink) is weak. So that is different, too.
DCSSA: because we are doing this interview for future graduate student, could you tell me your most difficult moment and how you tackled it and what is the moment you felt most successful?
Hiroaki: my graduate school career was not that successful I should say, in terms of output research. Especially in my first two years, I was doing something about cell adhesion molecules which has nothing to do what I have just explained. Basically I was trying to do something and then nothing had worked. So I had to find another project almost one and a half year after I started. Basically No Result. And then, I started two projects in which one project turned out to be thesis project. Another project I did was to make a knockout animal of one of cadherin molecules. And what happened was that at that time I was culturing ES cells and making constructs and screened for 500 cells and all the cells are done by southern blotting. And I got no clones. So that was also quite disappointing. So basically I wasted a lot of time of my time—actually half of my graduate school time just wasted.
DCSSA: that also depends on your definition of “waste”. Actually you went to the Buck lab, a very famous lab in Harvard, which meant that you must have something that made you chosen from other many applicants.
Hiroaki: I don’t know how she decided. At that point she just got her Howard Hughes, so she must have a lot of money to spend. I guess it was more of time issue; I applied for a position when she needed somebody. And there was a lot of issues. You know beside Buck lab, I wrote ten more letters to various labs; it is not like every lab wanted me, so it is really a time thing, and I think I was very lucky.
DCSSA: actually you were very successful in Buck lab. Did that have anything to do with the education you received in Kyoto University?
Hiroaki: what benefited me? Because I failed, I actually experienced a lot of experiments, like ES cells, cell culture, although I failed, I actually experienced it. Before that was a gene regulation issue, although it was not fruitful, I addressed it. So I have experience from cloning to in situ hybridization to making antibodies and do cell culture work such as dissociation of brain cells. So I learned a lot of techniques, which actually helped me a lot because her lab was really good at molecular biology like DNA but they have basically zero experience dealing with cells and tissues. And my technique fitted very well, because my first work was to pick single neurons and make cDNA libraries from the neurons and compare the expression. And to do that you not only need molecular biology technique, you also need cell biology technique so that you can dissect the tissue and dissociate the neurons alive and you pick good cells. And all these are familiar to me because of my graduate school. And Buck lab had this very good protocol to do PCR and other molecular biology. So in this way I benefited from my education. And another thing is that Linda was only interested in important questions like it would be great if you find this but people know it is difficult. But she was only interested in such kind of thing, which I agreed at the moment because I want to do very “important” research in my graduate school career rather than doing something you can do it. So in that sense, I complete agree with her and two papers were published related to identifying receptors. These receptor people, even though they tried many years, but with our technology we were able to do it. So the first one was to compare two receptor neurons and the second one was to take advantage of human genome project to look for new receptor genes. So both of them were at the moment not technically established. So everything was new to everybody, so the question was to how you take advantage of the new development to benefit your project.
DCSSA: apparently your successful career at Buck’s lab helped you a lot when you applied the position here at Duke University. But beside good publication, what were the other reasons that make Duke University believe you were the right reason to hire?
Hiroaki: OK, so I think that kind of thing…. After I became a faculty I came to know what other faculties think important. Two things are apparently important. One is that you are doing good science. And the other thing is that you communicate well. These are very important in the terms of the post-doc and also very important from faculties’ point of view. As a colleague, they want they colleague in different ways: one direct colleague is a collaborator, if his new technology will benefit my own research; it is not just that: if that person is doing research even if he is in a different field, that would stimulate me to think. So I think a communication does not necessarily mean that you just talk well; by research, if you stimulate others, it is a very nice quality.
DCSSA: after you became a PI, you have kept a very good publication record. Could you tell me why you can give out one powerful paper after another and your research strategy?
Hiroaki: although you say I was successful, in fact I had zero papers in first 3 years. I was OK with that. Basically I was thinking to start something new. I don’t want to carry something from my post-doc career; apparent I stayed in the same field: I carried my techniques and knowledge but in terms of projects I started completely new. And I wanted to ask something important. I think I got really lucky in a way, because the NIH funding was really good, unlike now so I had an easy time to get my first R1, which is very important for junior faculty. Although I didn’t publish in my first 3 years, R1 has 5 years so basically I got R1 and I have 5 years to do something. So I can concentrate on my research. If I had a hard time to get a R1, then it could be very difficult.
DCSSA: Could you explain more about your research strategy? I talked to your former rotation student, who said that you are actually open to a lot of questions in the same field.
Hiroaki: in the same field yes. So I know about the field and I know what is important in the field and I also think what I can do that other may not be able to do, so I want to use my strength. In terms of what project you choose for your student, the important thing is that the student is highly motivated. And every student has a kind of different preference. So I usually initiate a discussion with my student and for the rotation student it can be different—it can be some leftover from other project, but for the graduate student, we have a discussion of what they want to do and find a problem that is important and we go after it.
DCSSA: your lab has a joint meeting with other labs. Could you tell me some advantage about that joint meeting, and how do you like it?
Hiroaki: Ok, of course, it has advantages. This joint lab meeting started actually… there was a former PI Hubert Amrein, his lab was next to us. So the joint meeting started with 2 labs and then as time goes on, many people added in like Tracy, Nina Sherwood and it grew, and now we have 7 labs. It is very stimulating to see what other labs are doing. It is basically progress report from different labs and mainly graduate students and post-docs present. So it is really have a feeling to have a big lab. Listening lab report from other labs is good. The finished research result is good to hear, but it is also good to hear some premature and preliminary data and then discuss it. And I like that. I like to see the process, how a very strange piece of data becomes an interesting finding and when I look at the progress at other labs I feel very excited about that.
DCSSA: and my next question is related to Chinese students. You apparently have the experience to work with a lot of people from China. How do you value them, do you find any specific merits or demerits on them?
Hiroaki: first of all, that depends on the personality. There are good Chinese students and bad Chinese students. I don’t judge by nationality but I think East Asian people in general have a higher standard in terms of their amount of time they spent in the lab. In the evenings most people you see are from East Asian countries. I think it is good scene, but it is not true for everybody. I can tell because Japanese people are also like that. I guess spending a lot of time in the lab is generally good but it is not equal to higher output. Some students spend a lot of time producing not much. I think the amount of time is not the best measurement; there are some people only spending 8 hours a day—they are very concentrated and do a lot of good work. I think for the all the international students the language is the biggest challenge. The only way to improve it is just discuss it with your PI or others—that would make you a better scientist and better your language skills. There is no downside about it talking about science in English.
DCSSA: Could you tell me what was your biggest challenge for you when you first came to the United States? The language?
Hiroaki: the language was definitely one. Although I can speak, I cannot understand half of they say unless they speak really slowly. I can only say 50% of what I wanted to say. So that is also very frustrating. So that is also something personality. I guess I am not too sensitive to that kind of stress. I know many of other international students got stressed due to their inability to communicate. I think because there are many kinds of students, you first must understand yourself well and address that issue, and there is no single solution for that.
DCSSA: as my next question, can I ask your opinions towards papers written by Chinese? Because I know there are some Chinese people doing plagiarism and falsifying their data. So I am wondering what is your attitude toward Chinese Papers?
Hiroaki: OK, that feeling? There are definitely some incidents that occurred. But I don’t think it is specific to Chinese people. You know falsifying data is a big problem, but I don’t think it is biased towards Chinese people; maybe it is because there are more Chinese researchers than those from other countries, there are more examples. (laugh) But I don’t think proportionally it is biased against Chinese people. It is really important of course. There are these course that when you know you are a scientist, you know what is allowed and not, for example the gel data. If you want to falsify data, it will only do bad things to you. I see no reason you should do it. Because maybe 20 years after you can be found, you can be fired! Actually the only falsifying I know was done by a Chinese, who was my colleague at Linda Buck’s lab. He published 3 papers as top authors, and Linda had to drop all these 3 papers. This had a great damage to her psychologically and scientifically. And I can tell it is very hard to prevent it. If a post-doc or a graduate student comes with a piece of data, there is no reason to doubt him. So it is hard to prevent it. I also realized that being a professor meant being responsible for everything. I just hope that those things would not happen to me. I am involved in the actual experiment, so I am safer. But for those students who want to be independent, it is fine. If they come with nice data, I am happy.
DCSSA: Nowadays, there are more career choices after graduation from graduate school. Whatever your students choose, post-docs or industry, during 5 years under your mentor, how do you plan to educate them? Another way to address this question is that what kind of qualities do you expect them to have after 5 years in your lab?
Hiroaki: there is no single answer to that question because all I want for them is to have a happy life. And the definition of “happiness” totally depends on the person, right? It is easier for me to measure in academia, how that person is successful or not. But “being successful” may not be equal to “being happy”. So it is really hard to say what I expect them. The only things I hope are that after graduation, they had a great time in my lab and benefit their life in anyways. It can be scientific contributions but can also be something different. Because that person can go to the industry and something totally unrelated research. I think it is really a personal issue. And all I can do is publishing good theses. And after graduation, if that person needs my opinion or help, I will be happy to help. It is nice to hear things from former students?
DCSSA: Are you keeping in close relationship with your former students?
Hiroaki: I think so. Although I don’t have too many students, I keep a close contact with them.
DCSSA: How do you arrange everyday with both professional life and real life?
Hiroaki: Science is sort of like unique in a way that you have to like what you do. OK, let’s say you love video games, and there are professional video gamers, and I don’t know if there is any difference between professional gamers and me. Because what I do is what I like to do. And professional video gamers, I can also imagine that they have difficult time making money doing video games. So my point is that there are something that I don’t want to do when I feel stressed, but all of them are for the science which I like to do. And in terms of professional life and real life, if the people surrounding me don’t understand the science, it is quite difficult. These people don’t have to understanding the content of the project, but rather the life and how science is done.
DCSSA: and how do you like science?
Hiroaki: I like science, but it doesn’t mean I like science more than anything else. It all comes down to how I feel happy. Doing science makes me happy but other things makes me happy too. Maybe doing other things may ultimately help me do science. But I have the feeling that science is very important to me, and I won’t give this up.
DCSSA: As my last question, regarding to future applicants, how do you determine which students you want to enroll into the Duke University?
Hiroaki: I never was one of the recruiting committee members so it is not a question for me, but if I were to choose a bunch of students, I imagine it would be very difficult to judge based on anything. If you have a better score, you are better; if you talk about your recommendation letters, some are stronger than others. It is really difficult how good a person is. Even when he is doing a rotation with you.
DCSSA: how about the time you pick potential rotation students?
Hiroaki: two things. One thing is that he like doing science. The other things whether or not I interact with that person good or not. It doesn’t mean that I need to talk to that person all the time. I cannot describe the personality that I feel preferable to others. It is more like chemistry or a fit, not simply good or bad. And being a rotation student certainly helps.
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