Chapter 4: Furthering a Research Career at MD Anderson

Chapter 4: Furthering a Research Career at MD Anderson

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Description

Dr. Travis begins this Chapter by explaining that she was aware of MD Anderson throughout her career. After her post-doctoral fellowship at the Gray Laboratory, she was recruited to serve as Cancer Expert at the National Institutes of Health (National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD, 1979−1982) and she was recruited by Lester Peters for MD Anderson in 1982. Next Dr. Travis explains how her work on radiation damage to normal lung tissue in mice had implications for patient care. She describes some experiments conducted to explore radio-protectors, radio-sensitization, and strategies for changing the fractionation of beams to do less tissue damage. She undertook this work at MD Anderson and mentions individuals she worked with and the seminal data produced showing that it was better to use a lot of radiation on a small area of tissue to do the least damage to normal disuse.

Dr. Travis notes that she came to MD Anderson as an Associate Professor and she was the only woman in the Department of Experimental Radiation Oncology. She describes the department as very vibrant, one of the best in the field, and she brought her focus on normal tissue, which no one else was researching at the time. She also observes that the Department “took a chance” on her, as she had no grant funding at the time. However her first R01 grant proposal was funded; she also had a program project grant.

Dr. Travis describes how writing grant proposals helped her develop as a researcher during her first years at MD Anderson. She explains how a grant proposal creates a road map for an experiment and forces the researcher to articulate hypotheses and think about a research question in a holistic way. “You see it from 35,000 feet,” she says.

Dr. Travis compares her experience at MD Anderson with the environment at the NCI.

Identifier

TravisEL_01_20140324_C04

Publication Date

3-24-2014

City

Houston, Texas

Topics Covered

The Interview Subject's Story - The Researcher The Researcher Joining MD Anderson Evolution of Career Professional Path Professional Practice The Professional at Work On Research and Researchers Discovery and Success Collaborations

Transcript

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Plus, I mean, I had two goals when I went to London. Number one was to really develop my research skills, my knowledge, publish, and position myself for an independent career in science. That was my goal. And to do that, I just worked all the time, to the point that Jack Fowler, the head of the lab, used to ban me from the lab on the weekends, you know. He’d say, “No, you can’t work every weekend.” But it paid off. It paid off because at the end of three years—I went there for between one and three years, and I was supposed to go back to South Carolina, but I decided I didn’t want to go back there. MD Anderson had always been in my sights as a place to be because MD Anderson had a reputation. It was well known for its work on normal tissue damage. Rod Withers was here for years, and he was kind of the father of normal tissue injury.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

I’m sorry, his name again?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Rodney Withers, W-i-t-h-e-r-s. He was here at MD Anderson as chair of then the experimental—I can’t remember whether it was a department or not, but he ran the Experimental Radiation Oncology Group. So I always had my sights on MD Anderson, and I had met him and a lot of the people here, so I didn’t want to go back to South Carolina. So I was recruited to the NIH. I went to the NCI for a couple years. At that time, they had a position called cancer experts, which were for new postdocs just developing, coming out of their postdoc, that they thought had promise. I went there for a couple years and—

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Seventy-nine to ’82 is what I have.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

And I was recruited here by Lester Peters, who was then the chair of Radiation. He was coming here as the head of Radiation Oncology, and he called me, and he said, “You know I’m going to Houston.” I knew him because of the three years at that lab, everybody went to that lab, and Jack took us to every meeting. He made sure we went to meetings. He said, “You have to go to meetings to present your work.” So I knew all these people.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Again, great mentoring.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Great mentoring and sponsorship, which is my new thing I talk a lot about. Anyway, so Lester called me at the NCI and said, “I’d like you to come and be the normal tissue person. I’d like you for that position.” So I accepted that, and that’s how I got here. A very long story, I’m afraid.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

No, no, not at all.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

And they took a chance on me, too, because I had no grant money, and I didn’t have to write any grants, ever, but I published a lot. You know, it was work that was making a difference. I had branched out. I had started doing work on the gut as well as work on skin, but mostly lung. I was really known for my work in lung, but we did some really seminal work in the gut as well that’s still frequently quoted.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

A couple questions I wanted to ask you. Now, the work that you did on irradiating mice and the noninvasive technique to assess lung damage, in what way did that translate into effects for humans or interventions for humans?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Well, the whole goal was to, first of all, assess it, be able to measure it, and then look for ways of intervening. We did a number of it—well, one, there were two ways at the time when I was at the Gray Lab and when I first went to the NCI, what we were working on were radio-sensitizers, which were to desensitize tumors, radio-protectors to sensitize normal tissues or to protect the normal tissues, and also ways of changing the fractionation and the volume of tissue irradiated because that can change. The question was, could we change the effect by changing the way we fractionate. Should we give it in large doses? Should we give it in much smaller doses? And then to ask the question, would that change the therapeutic ratio; i.e., would you have less lung damage for the same amount of tumor damage. So that’s how it translates. So a lot of the experiments, particularly at the Gray Lab, were focused on fractionation. These were experiments that went round the clock. We did fractionation experiments. We’d fractionate the doses and give it every four hours. We had to deliver a lot of dose in a very short period of time to the animals, so that’s why even when I came here and started the lab here, we did some fractionation experiments in the gut that we went around the clock, for, like, three and a half days or four days. So it was all about that, and then it was about using protectors and asking the question, if some of the experiments I did at the NCI and then here, too, was using protectors in the lung, how would protectors—

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

When you say “protectors,” what do you mean?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Mostly they were free radical scavengers. In fact, I just finished a grant that I had with a colleague. Up until just a couple years ago, we were still working on that to scavenge the free radicals which basically do the damage, and if we did that, would we protect the lungs. Then the other thing that we worked on here, which was a woman who’s now one of our radiation oncologists, her name is Xing Liao, L-i-a-o. Xing came to my lab because she had met—all these stories are always so long, aren’t they? People in science are so interconnected and related. She met Kian Ang, who just recently passed away, who was a very good friend. I knew Kian from when I was in London. But she wanted to come. He came to me and said, “Liz, I met this woman from China. She wants to come and work in the lab. Will you take her in your lab?” And I said, “Sure,” and I did. One of the experiments, she did some of the seminal experiments on irradiating very, very, very small areas of lung, because then we were interested in doing—the question in radiation oncology in the clinic was, should we give a lot of dose to a little bit of lung or smaller doses to a whole lot of the lung. Nobody had the answer to that, so we did those experiments in mice, and Xing did these experiments, and they were the first papers that were done on irradiating very small volumes of mouse lung and then seeing a lot—we called it “a lot to a little, or a little to a lot.” So it was Xing Liao and Sue Tucker, who was here as well, and myself who did these experiments. As I said, they were the seminal data on—people are still doing these kinds of experiments, but it was here at MD Anderson that we did these first.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

What were the findings?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

The findings of the other question we asked, would it make a difference if it was in the base of the lung or in the apex of the lung, etc., and the findings were that it was better to give a lot to a little than a little to a lot.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Oh, yes. I am pausing the recorder at 10:58. [recorder is paused

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Okay. I am starting up the recorder again at actually just a few seconds later, about 10:15.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

And I’m going to—because there were some differences in the apex and in the base of the lung as well—

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

But you can check on that, sure.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

I’ll check on that. So I actually came here as an associate professor. I missed the whole assistant professor piece. Wow.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Is that a good thing?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Oh, yes, yes, it is a good thing, because, first of all, I was a little bit older by this time. I mean, I really didn’t start my career till I came here in my first faculty position in 1982. I was thirty-nine years old, you know. That was pretty late to get going on this. For me it was not an issue, I never viewed it, but when I think about it now, I’m thinking people up here are saying, “Aren’t you ever going to retire?” and it’s like I haven’t worked as long as most people. I mean, not in this, at least, not in this career, because I started—I kind of had, I call it, the long and winding road till I finally got to where I wanted to be to be able to do what I wanted to do.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

] Well, tell me about when you got to MD Anderson and you set up your lab, you started making the connections in this place as an institution. So tell me that story. What pops to your mind as what was key in those first years?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

It was very exciting. It was very exciting. I was the only woman in the department. I knew a lot of the people here. I mean, that was the other thing. I knew Luka Milas, who was then the chair of the department; I knew Meyn, who’s still here; Bill Brock, who’s here; Marvin Meistrick. I met all these people. So it was like it wasn’t coming to a strange place. I knew everybody. I knew Lester. I knew people in radiation oncology. It was very exciting because this, again, was a very vibrant [inaudible], although the focus has changed. It was a very vibrant department, one of the best in the field, and it was exciting to be part of that. Not anybody at the time was working—Luka was working on tumors and some normal tissue, but I, again, was brought in to really get the normal tissue piece of the department up and running again, and it was a lot of fun. I was single, worked hard, doing experiments around the clock with my technicians, having summer students. I mean, it was just really great fun. Xing came along, did these experiments, and I had graduate students who came in eventually, wrote grants. I came in as a tenure-track associate professor without any grant funding, so I was under the gun, but then so was Lester. I mean, he took a real chance, I mean, and so did Luka. They took a real chance on me, and I think it was because I’d published so much and the data were well accepted and had changed some paradigms. So I started writing grants, which was a brand-new experience and challenge, to say the least, but, you know, those times are different. I remember, I mean, and this is hard for it to happen, my first R01 got funded. We had a program project grant and I had projects on that, and it was just a good time, a lot of fun, you know, giving talks, doing new science, building your—you know, continuing to develop my career, continued to develop the science.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Are there some ways in which your approach to science changed? How did you grow during that period in this new environment?

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

I guess it was the whole issue of really thinking about writing a grant. You learned how to write a grant.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Well, tell me about that.

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Yes. Well, so, I actually now—when you sit down, when you’re writing a grant, it’s painful. (laughs) When you’re done with it, at the end of it, it was always—it was like a great accomplishment, like an achievement, because—and what it is, it’s a roadmap, I mean, because, first of all, it really makes you focus on now, what’s the real hypothesis here, and what are the questions I want to answer, and what are the data that support it and what doesn’t support it, and that’s where most of the thinking goes in writing a grant. And then you design the experiments to answer your questions. So at the end of it, it was always like, “Wow, this is great, because now I have kind of a roadmap.” Of course, you deviate all over the place from that roadmap, because that’s how science is, but at least you’ve really—it really makes you sit down and think about it in a much more holistic way than you would if you were just designing experiments to answer questions, and so you see it in a—if you will, now, granted, you’ve got to step it up to probably the 35,000-foot level and then you’ve got to get down to the ground level, where you start designing experiments then, but you’ve got to start up here and look over all [inaudible]. And the other thing for me that I so enjoyed was being in a department that was in a clinical division. At the NCI, I was in a department that was in a clinical division as well. I was in Building 10, which was the clinical building. I was in the radiation oncology department there. Eli Glatstein was the chair then. Again, I mean, there, too, it was very exciting. In fact, the head of the Gray Lab, Jack Fowler [phonetic], after I’d been in the States for six months, he was a good friend of Eli’s and he knew a lot of people in the States, obviously. He came over, came to NCI, was my technician. I had a technician, and he and the technician did the experiments. I designed them. He said, “You need to get this up and running. You need to be writing the papers from the lab. You design the experiments and [I will] do the experiments.” Now, there’s a mentor.

Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD:

Wow. No kidding. (laughs)

Elizabeth Travis, PhD:

Isn’t that something? I mean, he had a great time, you know. He knew the people here. It was a good opportunity for him. We had a lot of fun. I mean, I always—for me, it was just always a lot of fun, you know, the interactions with all the people here, the interactions with the clinic. It was an exciting time. It was an exciting time.

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Chapter 4: Furthering a Research Career at MD Anderson

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