How one researcher is using common-cold viruses as vaccine delivery platforms for infectious diseases such as SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus

 

Dr. Lynda Coughlan is a researcher and Assistant Professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. Interested in virology since childhood, Dr. Coughlan’s academic career has taken her from her native Ireland to Scotland, England, and the USA. She earned her PhD at Barts Cancer Institute in London, where her research involved manipulating adenoviral vectors to achieve targeted gene delivery to tumor cells.

We recently interviewed Dr. Coughlan to learn more about her research in developing adenovirus vectors for use as a possible coronavirus vaccine delivery system, as well as her thoughts on the challenges faced by women in academia, the sudden rise of Internet virology “experts,” and the trials of working through a pandemic.

Has the pandemic caused any bottlenecks with your current research?

 

The peak of the pandemic in New York was a difficult time. Both of my technical staff were working remotely so I had to perform all of the wet lab work that is normally done by a team of three. At the same time, we had to write grants and papers, revise animal protocols, review papers, etc. We managed well in dividing our work, but I am glad to have both staff members back in the lab again. The biggest challenge now is trying to make up for lost time and also trying to advance our non-CoV-2 projects. These were stalled for several months as our institute only permitted ongoing work for SARS-CoV-2 and deemed other research as non-essential.

 

How does DNASTAR software fit into your research?

 

I have been using DNASTAR Lasergene for about eight years now.

My team largely uses SeqBuilder Pro and SeqMan Pro. We find the software easy to use and annotate. I particularly like the plasmid auto-annotation feature in SeqBuilder Pro, which helps quickly identify common regions when we receive plasmid construct maps from other labs.

We also love the ability to align multiple sequence reads while viewing the nucleotide and amino acid sequence, annotated regions on the backbone template and the chromatogram display at the same time. As we are sequencing large plasmids (approximately 40kbp), this helps us quickly identify any problem regions in the viral genome.

In addition, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit New York city hard in March/April 2020, the DNASTAR team was fantastic in setting up portable licenses for my staff to work remotely.

 

How do you think the changes we’ve seen during the pandemic will impact the research community long-term?

 

One aspect of the pandemic which has been both a blessing and a curse has been the rise of pre-prints. Being able to quickly find well written, well-designed studies reporting early findings, sequences, and vaccine constructs during this pandemic has helped the research community to advance vaccine and therapeutic platforms. Sadly, it has also been the source of some very poor or sensationalistic data which has “gone viral” on social media before scientists had the time to criticize it.

We have also witnessed the rise of many “experts” who have huge numbers of followers on Twitter. They present themselves as authorities on SARS-CoV-2 but do not have relevant expertise or training and frequent misinterpret or misreport new publications or research findings. This has resulted in a need for scientists to spend time on social media trying to counteract bad science.

The good news is that there will likely be a lot more interest in vaccine research! Perhaps I’m biased, but I like to think that this pandemic will inspire a diverse new generation of young people to consider the fields of virology, immunology, and vaccinology as an exciting future career choice.

 

Speaking of young people, we mentioned you’ve been interested in virology since childhood. How and when did you decide to become a scientist?

 

I was a very curious child and was always drawn to biology. When I was child, my mother was studying Art and had a lot of art books around the house. I remember being fascinated by a book with anatomical drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, and perhaps that stimulated an interest in the human body. As a young child, I was also very fortunate to have great teachers who were interested in nature, plants, and animals.

I grew up in the 1980s, when the HIV epidemic was prominent news. During that time, I became interested in viruses and microbiology. This interest stayed with me right into high school where I selected biology, chemistry, and physics as my main non-core subjects. It was always clear to me that I wanted to be a scientist, and I knew that someday I wanted to have my own research group. It’s rare to be sure of what you want to do from a very young age, so I am thankful that I have managed to successfully achieve my childhood dreams.

 

What are your thoughts on scientific collaboration? Have you noticed any increase in collaboration during the pandemic?

 

A good collaboration should be a two-way, mutually beneficial relationship. I have found that the best collaborations are when there is limited competing interest (overlap) and investigators are fair, honest, and upfront about contributions and plans for formal acknowledgement.

In the past, I have encountered unsupportive mentors or co-workers who sought to exclude, undermine, or disregard my expertise or contribution to collaborative projects. That was actually a good lesson to learn in terms of resilience and choosing collaborators wisely. If you believe in your research ideas then you should listen to and appreciate those colleagues who take the time to offer constructive advice and new perspectives. At the same time, you must learn to ignore those who dismiss you or your hypotheses without offering any constructive criticism.

During the pandemic, I have witnessed increased collaboration but also an undesirable undercurrent of competitiveness and a desire to “be the first”, rather than working for the greater good.  I suppose this is the nature of academia, but it has just become more prominent during the pandemic.

I know that a lot of female scientists or scientists with parental or caring duties have been negatively impacted by school closures and the need to work remotely. Although institutes are trying to support them, it is not enough. The long-term damage to their careers may sadly drive a lot of talent out of research.

 

In the USA, women make up only about a quarter of STEM faculty. What challenges have you faced being a female researcher in academia?

 

Many women and other under-represented minorities working in academia find it frustrating that their perceived value and their opportunities for networking or career advancement are diminished in comparison to that of male colleagues. There is often a lack of transparency and culture of silence around this topic in academia.

I have personally experienced pay disparities between my salary and that of equally or less-qualified male peers. I have also experienced covert “exclusionary sexism”: not getting a seat at the table when important meetings or discussions are happening, despite having relevant or key expertise.

 

How do you deal with setbacks in your research?

 

In terms of research, I have always found that challenges and setbacks that might seem upsetting at the time often lead to new breakthroughs or force you to approach a problem from a new angle. This is part of the struggle in academia that I enjoy…to an extent!