How I became a biochemist—from Moscow to Philadelphia, by way of Charlottesville: A story of one Wood/Whelan fellowship journey (2009)

It was an eventful, yet troubled beginning of the 90s in Moscow. A failed attempt at a coupe d'état in August of 1991 was followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union in early 1992. In fact, a slightly frightening premonition of dramatic changes and a growing feeling of a weird mix of enthusiasm and insecurity were in the air since the late 80s. We all hoped for the best, and some things did change for the better: the fall of the Berlin wall and Gorbachev's reforms brought to us unheard of freedom of speech and travel abroad. Yet, the situation in my country was far from quiet, as the economy rapidly deteriorated. Inflation (the term that my generation learned for the first time in a college course on the Marxist theory of capitalism but was irrelevant before the 90s) was rampant. Thanks to newly granted freedom to travel, more and more researchers in the Institute of Experimental Cardiology, a premiere National biomedical research center in Moscow, went on long-term fellowships in American and in European research centers. This was a general trend for younger scientists at premiere research centers and institutes in Moscow and other cities with advanced biomedical enterprises, including St. Petersburg, Kiev, and Novosibirsk. It turned out that most of these temporary leaves transformed into long-term assimilation into research, teaching, or other endeavors abroad. By a conservative account, about 200 researchers from the Institute of Experimental Cardiology were working in the USA and other Western countries by the mid-nineties. Since then, very few have returned to Moscow and some managed to attain fairly successful careers in their new countries. I was a researcher in the Institute of Experimental Cardiology and worked on drug delivery in cardiovascular systems pursuing two principal approaches: drug carriage by erythrocytes and affinity targeting to vascular endothelium. I feel incredibly fortunate that I have been able to continue to explore these two research directions for the last 16 years at the University of Pennsylvania. One of my drug targeting projects deals with protection against ischemic injury in organ transplantation. We all know that transplantation is a very risky, injurious, and complicated process with low rates of long-term success. This is the story of my transplantation from Moscow to Philadelphia that encompassed an unpredictable and complicated chain of events and reactions, not unlike the propagation of signal transduction cascades in a cell. Indeed, very much like cellular signal transduction that needs a receptor to ignite the process, there was a key component that initiated my relocation and provided the mechanism for its implementation, progress, and eventual success. Yes, it was the IUBMB Wood/Whelan Award for visiting scientist fellowship. In the beginning of 1991, I came across the announcement of this Award (perhaps, no caps are in order here, but it will be always a capital “A” for me) in the Biochemical Journal. Shame on me, but I had no idea who Wood and Whelan were, 20 years ago; presumably, they were two big shots—that is all that at that time a young Russian fellow not too concerned about personal histories of the old lions of contemporary science could imagine. I now realize that many young researchers tend to pay little attention to their predecessors and their stories of life in science, but as I am becoming more seasoned, these things have become more and more interesting to me. Needless to say, by now I am quite familiar with biographies of these past Presidents of IUBMB, two giants of biochemistry and molecular biology of the 20th century (actually, Dr. Whelan is actively pursuing research in the University of Miami and serves as an Editor-in-Chief of this Journal). Based on the announcement, I prepared a research proposal for a 3 month visit to the laboratory of Professor Ronald P. Taylor at the University of Virginia. I had learned from the literature about Ron's work on blood clearance of pathogens and toxins to the phagocytes, using red blood cells as carriers. There were interesting parallels between his studies and my attempts to couple drugs and affinity vectors to red blood cells. I wrote to Ron asking if he would agree to accept me for 3 months in his lab and outlined my research proposal to compare two conjugation approaches. Ron enthusiastically endorsed the idea (as I learned later, Ron is a very enthusiastic and supportive individual, who became a good friend). I prepared the proposal and sent it to the IUBMB. I was not optimistic for success, but I had to try. Well, as you already have figured out, the letter of Award came to Moscow, to my delight, disbelief and euphoria! The leadership of the Moscow Institute was so supportive that they agreed to cover my airfare. To make a long story short, one February evening, particularly dark and unusually cold by Virginia's standards, Ron picked up a slightly disoriented and excited Russian guy carrying a very large guitar case at the Greyhound station in Charlottesville. This was a beginning of three unforgettable months that turned out to be a very happy and productive time in my life, and not only in a scientific way. In the spirit of transparency and openness that we, Russian scientists, got the first taste of 20 years ago and we, American scientists, have a full course meal of now (signing endless disclaimers of conflict of interests and financial relationships), I must disclose that since the 70s I have had a hobby of writing songs—music and lyrics (of course, in Russian). Nothing fancy, just simple guitar cords and slightly nasal weak voice. But we Russians, are an unusual bunch (remember, Dostoyevsky: “strange Russian soul”?); there are people who like these unpretentious songs. By a coincidence, just a year before my visit to Ron, one amateur singer who knew and performed my songs emigrated from Kiev to NYC, got friendly with other émigrés in Philadelphia and introduced my songs to our American compatriots. As Ron recently put it, introducing me as a keynote speaker at a Bioengineering Symposium at The University of Virginia a few years ago, “Vladimir worked very hard and productively when he was a visiting scientist in my lab—we published three joint papers based on these 3 months of research. Yet, I noticed that every weekend he packed his guitar and flew around the US to give concerts to Russian communities”. This is not verbatim, and in many cases, these concerts were mere extras to scientific seminars, but the facts are correct: some voiceless singing in Russian was presented in few American cities. Philadelphia happened to be one of those innocent victims of our Meistersinger. After the concert, when Smirnoff and other typical Russian beverages were consumed to solidify the eternal union of an artist and audience according to the national tradition, my host (who is one of my very best friends now) mumbled that his niece was a graduate student at PENN and she would be glad to arrange my seminar there. At that time, I had not heard yet about the Ivy League and had no idea about the rating of US schools, but when I came there, to the John Morgan Building on Spruce Street, one of the oldest medical schools in the country, I was thrilled. My seminar went especially well, and the audience was really interested in my research in targeting antioxidant enzymes to endothelial cells. After the seminar, my host, Professor Aron B. Fisher, Director of the Institute for Environmental Medicine at PENN, explained to me that oxidative stress in the pulmonary endothelium is one of his main interests and that my research would fit really well at his institute. A few weeks later, when I returned to Moscow, a FEDEX envelope was awaiting in my mailbox. It was Aron's invitation to join the IFEM as a research fellow for an initial term of 2 years, which inevitably transformed into much a longer association. Thus, PENN became my new professional home 16 years ago. There were numerous fortunate events since then: successful (and not) experiments, new exciting findings and ideas, seminars, collaborations, conferences. I was fortunate to have the opportunity to develop a growing and productive research and teaching program. In many senses, my life, especially scientific life, became more and more fulfilled, and I was able to pursue numerous new opportunities. Thanks to new friends, including several senior PENN faculty who got interested in my research and provided a “slightly disoriented Russian fellow” with exceptional help and guidance, these efforts translated into papers, seminars, grants, new awards, etc. But all this became possible due to the Award—the IUBMB Wood/Whelan Award for visiting fellowship. P.S. And yes, I still flirt with and enjoy writing songs and even recorded a few CD albums since moved to the USA, something I could not dream of in the Soviet Union. Actually, just a month ago, I finished recording the 3rd CD album with my songs in Russian. VRM thanks Dr. Ronald P. Taylor (University of Virginia) for editing this memoir.