The Electric Pursuit
© Catherine McKenzie
For Catherine McKenzie, the journey to the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) in 2013 was a collision of personal and professional magnetism. While her relocation was prompted by a personal connection to the region, the primary catalyst for her commitment was the “dynamic and creative scientific environment” offered at ISTA. Catherine took a leap of faith backed by the endorsement of trusted mentors and the new arrival of well-respected neuroscientists, Jozsef Csicsvari and Peter Jonas.
“I have no regrets,” she recalls about completing her PhD at ISTA in 2018.
Though she ultimately joined the Janovjak group, she never felt limited by the rigid departmental structures prevalent in other institutions and engaged frequently with scientists across other fields and disciplines. The coffee area was a regular hotbed for debate and Catherine recalls one such instance with a professor who wanted to model synaptic weights. Catherine contended that the sheer plasticity of a neuron’s fundamental unit made it impossible to account for every necessary variable. Rather than being dismissed, she was met with rigorous engagement. “It was so cool that this professor, who wasn’t even my supervisor, was fully engaging with me,” she reflects.
During her time at ISTA, Catherine mastered the art of manipulating synaptic proteins using chemo- and optogenetics. This expertise propelled her through her time as a postdoc at the Interdisciplinary Institute for Neuroscience in France and eventually into her current role as a Discovery Scientist at Roche in Switzerland. Today, her work is at the cutting edge of precision medicine. Developing treatments for disorders that currently have no medical recourse, she identifies dysfunctional genes and replaces them with healthy counterparts. She is currently applying these methodologies along with others to neuromuscular disorders in order to restore patient health.
Outside of her work and the lab, she typically keeps a puzzle nearby as something that she can pick up, put down, and leisurely do over time without pressure—or so she thought. “I made the gross mistake of getting a New Yorker puzzle because it had dogs on it. It is unreasonable that anybody could find any connecting piece.” As the frustrating puzzle remains out for Catherine to work on, it is fair to guess that she approaches her downtime hobby with the same energy she has approached science through her academic and professional careers. “It was really just about what set my brain on fire, and I chose that over and over and over again. If you follow what makes you feel electric on the inside, you are going to go far.”
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* The Janovjak group is no longer affiliated with ISTA.
