A Conversation with a Scientist: Profiles in Research

What comes to mind when you think of a scientist? As a child, the first depictions I encountered – produced by cartoonists, writers, and movie directors – were as strange as they were varied: diabolical madmen, distinguished professors, harmless eccentrics, learned buffoons. A scientist was a middle-aged man who wore white coats and surrounded himself with test tubes and clunky machine dials. He was wicked smart but awkward, unsociable in person but animated in the lab. One day he might straighten up and shout: “I’ve found it! I’ve found it!” And, of course, he was always a ‘he’.  

It took a while to develop a more well-rounded perception. And thankfully, with a few exceptions, these images are now seldom seen. But that idea of the scientist as intelligent but unfriendly, competent but cold, has persisted and ramified. This is made worse by the fact that most people don’t know a scientist personally and have never witnessed their work in action. During the pandemic, trust in scientists eroded dramatically, pointing to the challenging but critical need to reimagine who a scientist is and what they are capable of. 

A 2019 study entitled ‘Using selfies to challenge public stereotypes of scientists’ found that scientists who posted self-portraits (“selfies”) to Instagram from the science lab/field were perceived as significantly warmer and more trustworthy – and no less competent – than those posting photos of only their work. Encouragingly, participants who viewed female scientist selfies also perceived science as less exclusively male. Scientists, it seems, may be able to increase public trust and interest in science simply by humanizing ourselves. 

It was in view of this that I caught up with Indra Bishnoi, a 4th year Neuroscience PhD student at Western University, and a longtime friend. We discussed her research, her path to becoming a scientist-in-training, and her interests outside of the lab. Here is a transcript of our chat. 

(Note: ‘IB’ refers to Indra, and ‘DO’ to Dika, the interviewer.)

DO: What study path did you take to get into neuroscience research? Could you give us a rundown of your path so far?

IB: My career trajectory has been a little different from what you might expect from a Neuroscience PhD student. Most people come in with a background in science, having completed an undergraduate degree in neuroscience or a related field. And then there's me. I studied psychology and sociology in undergrad – so I came in with a very different set of skills. What happened was, during my undergrad, I took a few classes that really married psychology and biology. And one of those happened to be taught by Dr. Klaus-Peter Ossenkopp. This was during my fourth year, and up to that point many of my classes had really pushed the idea that mental health stems predominantly from changes occurring in the brain – but something always felt missing to me. During the course with Dr. Ossenkopp I learnt about the gut-brain axis, which was mind-blowing to me. It doesn’t sound like much, but this really opened the doors for me to think about how the rest of our body impacts our mental health, how our psychology is always interacting with our biology. I really wanted to pursue that further, and Dr. Ossenkopp being the one that introduced me to this, I felt was the best person to reach out to. You know what's funny? That was the class I didn't do the hottest in that year, but it was the one I found the most fascinating.

DO: That is fascinating. So you had no idea you were going to go into neuroscience research at the graduate school level up until your fourth year of undergrad? 

IB: None at all. I honestly thought maybe psychology, maybe clinical psychology, you know? That was really the trajectory I thought I was going to take. I had already decided on pursuing research, but it wasn't in this direction at all. After that class I went up to Dr.  Ossenkopp and started having conversations with him because I was so intrigued by his work, and he said, we take summer students all the time, why don't you come and work with the lab? I’m pretty sure my eyes lit up at this point (at least it felt like they did). And so, it just kind of went from there. I did a summer position and then went on to do an independent study in the lab and then initially started a Master's, but quickly rolled over to a PhD. So that’s really what led me to Neuroscience – my interest in being able to explore not just the psychological, but also the sociological and biological components of us.

DO: Could you tell me a bit about your research? 

IB: Of course. I study learning and memory, particularly through the perspective of nausea. Nausea is interesting because it’s a sensation that is crucial for individual survival. In some cases, like if we eat something that’s toxic, nausea can be accompanied by vomiting to help us rid our bodies of the toxic substance. However, it can also help us avoid that substance in the future by bringing on that unpleasant sensation of nausea. Just by virtue of its underpinnings, to get a grasp on nausea you need to understand not just its central effects (e.g. on the brain) but also peripheral effects (e.g. its effect on other parts of our body, like our guts).

I study a particular type of nausea called anticipatory nausea, and chemotherapy-induced anticipatory nausea is an example that can be used to explain this, but there are other nauseating agents – like motion sickness – that can also lead to anticipatory nausea but seem to have slightly different mechanisms. But chemotherapy-induced anticipatory nausea starts out as an involuntary response directly to the chemotherapy, since is it really nauseating. However, once chemotherapy is repeatedly given within the hospital, it’s been shown that people start to associate even just the sight of the hospital with nausea. There are a lot of case studies and patient journals where patients pulling up to the parking lot of the hospital immediately begin feeling very nauseous by simply looking at the hospital. And that's when you know anticipatory nausea has developed, where we feel the sensation of nausea, without any direct nauseating stimulus like chemotherapy.

What I more specifically do is develop an animal model to understand how we can study and maybe even counteract this type of nausea. As much as nausea is important to learn, sometimes it can become misplaced, which is something that has led to chemotherapy-induced anticipatory nausea being the biggest reason for chemotherapy dropout. It’s like living with a life-threatening illness that can be treated, but just the sight of the treatment leaves you feeling sick – it’s scary. So, mimicking this response in animal models really helps in the development of preclinical tools we can use to better understand anticipatory nausea. That’s where lithium chloride comes in. 

DO: Lithium Chloride? 

IB: Yeah, you know, the history of lithium chloride is really interesting. Long story short, around the 1940s/50s some countries were looking for alternatives to salt for a couple of reasons, some have cited a salt shortage during World War II, while others were trying to restrict sodium intake for health reasons. It was found that a 25% solution of lithium chloride was “perfectly safe” to use as a salt replacement. So, it went well into circulation in some regions. But what they found was that people started feeling nauseous, and soon realized it was lithium chloride that was the culprit. It was taken out of circulation almost as quickly as it was introduced. What we now know is that lithium chloride is not only nauseating to humans, but to many other mammals as well. We’re now able to use lithium chloride to test the ability of different kinds of agents to counteract lithium-chloride induced nausea. And that's really what I'm looking at for my PhD.

DO: That is interesting. I'll be interested to learn more about that. But I know that besides research you do a lot of work on sustainability. You're the founder, I believe, of a sustainable and climate-conscious clothing brand called Jeo. Could you tell me a bit about that?

IB: Sure. I've been lucky enough to have the chance to spend my PhD not just focusing on research but also on a number of sustainability initiatives. I chaired the Sustainability Committee at the Society of Graduate Students here at Western, and in this role my amazing committee and I worked to get the first climate declaration out at Western. It was a long two-and-a-half-year process, but it was really rewarding. Western has now declared a climate emergency. I’m really thankful that we were able to catapult this initiative, but after that happened, I felt it was a good time for me to leave the committee. Though, I'm still involved in some aspects of community outreach at Western. I'm still a part of PACES, which is the President's Advisory Committee for Environment and Sustainability.

DO: That’s fascinating. What about your clothing brand? 

IB: Yeah. It’s funny because after finishing up with the Sustainability committee, I had networked with a lot of community partners in and around the city. This got me thinking about other ways I could make a difference from a sustainability standpoint, and that’s what got me started down the path of entrepreneurship. I was able to create a sustainable South Asian clothing brand. Basically, I did a lot of research to figure out what fabrics and techniques were the most sustainable after balancing several factors, from the carbon footprint to the water usage and everything in between. And then I connected with seamstresses here in London and the Greater Toronto Area where I've got some family. There was a lot of work and planning that went into it; I essentially began to set this up from April of last year, but the clothing line really launched in November. It was incredible because I sold out all my spots with my seamstresses the weekend we launched. It was so nice to see that response from the community, and to bring together people from so many different corners of the world with the goal of really trying to support sustainability and climate change initiatives – it was just so rewarding. But it did get overwhelming and, for now, I decided I need to take a step back. Now that I've got that proof of concept though, I think it gives me a lot more confidence. Fingers crossed I can continue to go down this path because I think in the future combining my research and my entrepreneurship interests is really in the books for me. It would be great to create a lab that works towards producing eco-friendly and sustainable fabrics. That's something I'm really excited for in the future. But for now, I’ve got to finish up this PhD!

DO: For sure, and that leads me very nicely to two questions I have for you. The first is, how do you juggle all these different interests? But I also want to know where you see yourself headed towards after your PhD?

IB: I feel like I never really have a good answer whenever I get this question because it depends so much on each individual. For me, I prioritize juggling things that I’m truly interested in, which are almost always in the realm of my research and/or sustainability. I think something that has thrown me off balance before is failure, but I’ve come to accept failure as just another check mark. Like, “ok we tried this, it didn’t work, what’s our next best course of action here.” Things don’t always work out – I hit many roadblocks with Jeo, and we've had to move my research project around a bit – but I find that every time those shifts happen, it only ends up getting better. So I think not being scared of failure and prioritizing my interests has been my mantra. But even with that, if I truly feel like I'm taking on too much work, I do take a step back, and come back when I can give it the time and dedication it deserves.

DO: Absolutely. And the second question is where do you see yourself heading from here?

IB: I'm considering two options right now. The first is to take a year to focus on entrepreneurship. I have fewer skills in this area in comparison to research so I want to sharpen those up because I think my path will really marry research and entrepreneurship. I’ve also been scouting labs that do a lot of interesting research looking at the changing climate and how that impacts us. There's a lot of interesting work going on, so I might end up going down the research path a bit longer as a postdoc. In the best version of it, I would love to have my own lab that looks at the impact of climate change on us, physically and mentally, and strives to come up with creative solutions to mitigate these effects!

DO: What advice would you give to a person considering pursuing a career in science at the graduate level? 

IB: My one advice is to go talk to the people who are in that field. One thing I've noticed is that people love talking about what they're doing. Many people will give you insights, answer your questions as honestly as possible, and may even open doors for you (thanks Dr. Ossenkopp!). That's something I tell my students as well because it is has really helped me. And I'm going to be honest with you: sometimes I'm shaking in my boots, but after I go up to people and talk to them, all that fear goes away when you realize how glad people are to talk about their paths. I feel like I could scream that from a rooftop.