Abigail Rogers, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA
In this new section of Interactions, we explore what it's like to work in different areas of plant microbe interactions. We will highlight scientists doing research in government, academia, and industry, as well as those who work in communication and policymaking. In this issue, Abigail Rogers, a Ph.D. student at Purdue University, talks with Dr. Matthew Helm, a molecular plant pathologist with the USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS).
Abigail (Abbie) Rogers is a Ph.D. student at Purdue University, working on effector proteins in bacterial and fungal pathogens. She is coadvised by Dr. Matthew Helm and Dr. Anjali Iyer-Pascuzzi in the Botany and Plant Pathology Department.
Dr. Matthew Helm is a research scientist in the crop protection unit of the USDA-ARS and an adjunct assistant professor in agronomy at Purdue University.
Abbie: For this IS-MPMI Interactions article, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Matthew Helm, my coadvisor for my Ph.D. thesis work. We were given a list of questions to answer, but I have written this piece to include some of the additional questions I asked Dr. Helm to provide some more colorful commentary. I attempted to accurately represent Dr. Helm's answers and provide some context to enlighten the reader as to the kind of person Dr. Helm is. My hope is that his good-natured character and dedication to being a great mentor comes through in this interview. I hope you enjoy this interview, with some side comments from me!
A: Hey Matt, are you ready to be interviewed?
M: Absolutely!
A: Could you please tell me about the research project you're most excited about right now?
M: I would say…oh, that's a tough one. I would say the tar spot effector work that you and Namrata (Dr. Namrata Jaiswal, postdoctoral research associate in the Helm lab) have done. One, I really like it for the novelty of the results, since it's a new and emerging pathogen, but two is that it's my first project that I have given to a PhD student and that you have led.
A: You're not just saying that because I'm the one interviewing you?
M: Well, there's the Fusarium project, but I started that one as a postdoctoral scientist. The effector project is the first project where you and I are working side by side, and it's provided a lot of good mentorship opportunities.
A: Okay, that's a great answer! Next question, what drew you to your current job in government?
M: The supportive research environment that the Crop Protection and Pest Control Research Unit has in fostering early-career scientists and the freedom to investigate biologically meaningful questions that are directly related to U.S. agriculture. I really liked that the USDA-ARS does high-quality research with stakeholders always in mind. But mostly, doing science with a meaning behind it is what drew me to the USDA-ARS.
Just a quick side note here from me (Abbie), since I have known Dr. Helm he has always been a vocal advocate for supporting early-career researchers. I personally feel that Dr. Helm makes a significant effort to recognize the excellent work being presented by researchers who may have not yet established themselves in our highly competitive field of molecular plant pathology and molecular plant-microbe interactions. Since I began working with Dr. Helm, I have noticed that he has always excelled at recognizing the accomplishments of his peers and mentees.
A: What made you want to be a molecular plant pathologist?
M: That's a good question. During my time as an undergraduate student, I took two plant courses that I really enjoyed: plant physiology and ethnobotany. So, after completing those two specific courses and my time as an undergraduate, I knew I wanted to perform research within the plant sciences. However, I also had taken human immunology and rather enjoyed studying the evolutionary arms race between humans and pathogens, but I knew that I didn't want to study human pathogens. That's when I found a lab at Indiana University that studied plant immunity at molecular, cellular, and genetic levels.
At this point in the interview, Dr. Helm walked his laptop into the kitchen and began to cook dinner for himself and his wife Ariel, who is soon graduating from her medical residency program in Greenville, SC. Talk about a power couple! During this time, Dr. Helm provided a little insight into his life by sharing that he really enjoys cooking and is generally the chef in his household.
A: What advice would you give to an incoming/beginning graduate student?
M: One piece of advice? I would say that, although your main focus as a Ph.D. student is working on exciting research projects, you also should seriously consider the lab environment. You want to consider how the PI interacts with postdocs, as well as graduate and undergraduate students, and what the lab dynamics are like. As a new graduate student, you may be working on several research projects at one time—some of which may succeed and others may not work out. Personalities and lab dynamics, however, change at a much slower pace than your projects, and you will likely be working with the same people for the next five to seven years. So, the lab environment, culture, and dynamics are just as important as the exciting research. I also should mention that incoming/beginning graduate students should consider joining a lab that emphasizes the importance of work-life harmony and mental health. It's so easy for the PI to prioritize research outputs (i.e., manuscripts, research talks, posters, successful grants, etc.) over the care and well-being of their team members. Doing so often results in a toxic, unsupportive work environment. Before joining a lab, make sure to ask the PI how they support work-life harmony among their team members.
A: What advice would you give to people starting up a laboratory and/or starting out on the job market?
M: Well, I'm only three years in to running my own lab, so maybe I'm not the most qualified person to comment on starting up a laboratory. What I can say is that starting a lab can be challenging, and there is an extremely large learning curve, but it's also so rewarding to bring in individuals to your team and interact with them and learn from them and watch them succeed. It's interesting to learn how to manage everyone on the team's preferences and how they like to learn, and it's exciting to celebrate their successes and watch them make progress. I would say that any challenges of starting a lab are offset by your team's successes. For starting out on the job market, my advice is don't ever take rejection personally. A lot of hiring decisions are made by committee members who may have a specific candidate already in mind, and if you don't meet that precise mold, you may be unlikely to be one of the top candidates. Never take rejection personally.
I would like to jump in here and note that not only does Dr. Helm give good career advice, but he frequently provides excellent life advice. Not only can I talk to Dr. Helm about my research, but we also discuss having a long-distance partner in residency, a life experience that we share. It is nice to have a mentor who can relate to you and is willing to provide advice on a shared experience!
A: Who has inspired you scientifically and why?
M: I'd say that the scientist who had the greatest impact on me would be Roger Innes. The reason being, I grew the most and matured the most as a scientist under his tutelage. When I joined Roger's lab I had very limited lab-based research experience, but when I joined his lab, I quickly learned how to become a careful and disciplined scientist, and I learned how to think like a scientist. He has continued to mentor me, and his lab is where I grew to be the scientist I am today.
A: Are you involved in other scientific/professional development activities? And, how do these contribute to your training?
M: I really enjoy reading and evaluating preprints on BioRxiv—that's a fun activity to do! It's rewarding to be able to give feedback to the authors and the plant pathology community. And, it's fun to read about all of the breaking and emerging discoveries before they are peer-reviewed in a journal. I also have read several books and attended seminars on how to be a more effective and supportive team leader. Once I stepped into my current role, I soon learned that I had no formal training on how to manage and lead members in my research group. I attended seminars and read several books about how to manage a research team effectively and efficiently using evidence-based approaches.
A: That's cool! Oh, this is a good one, what is the greatest challenge you have encountered in your career, and what did you do to overcome this challenge?
M: The greatest challenge I've encountered has been learning to be comfortable saying "no." It's a very simple task but rather important, especially as an early-career researcher. Your time is limited as it is, and its challenging to say no to collaborations and research projects, but you'll need to do that in order to save your time. You need to recognize that in saying "yes" to all things, you are sacrificing important time from the core group you work with.
A: I like that answer. How could people find you on social media?
M: The only social media I have is a twitter account. My handle is @mattdhelm19.
A: Oh wait, do you mean you have an X account?
M: Oh yeah, sorry, X.
A: What is your favorite story from an IS-MPMI meeting?
M: There was a time when I was at the Glasgow meeting, in 2019, a bunch of early-career scientists and I all went out to a Vietnamese restaurant. We were all commiserating about the challenges that come along with being an early-career researcher. We also talked about where we eventually wanted be in our careers (i.e., academia, industry, government, nonprofit, etc.). Looking back at that moment, we've all ended up where we've wanted to be. It's one of those memories where we all had great food, and we weren't sure where we'd be at the next IS-MPMI meeting, then when we all checked in at Providence (IS-MPMI 2023) we were all where we wanted to be!
With that, we concluded our interview. I imagine Dr. Helm went off to continue to cook dinner; meanwhile, I went to write up this interview and reflect on our conversation.
