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Bungo Akiyoshi, Ph.D., Group Leader at the University of Oxford, was the 2015 winner of our R.R. Bensley Young Investigator Award for Cell Biology. He spoke at the annual meeting at EB on the “Discovery of Unconventional Kinetochores in Kinetoplastids.” However, before this success he was a Ph.D. student in Dr. Sue Biggins' laboratory. Dr. Sue Biggins nominated Dr. Akiyoshi for his award, and is currently a Principal Investigator at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and was most recently elected to the National Academy of Sciences, and was appointed as an Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
We were able to interview both Drs. Biggins and Akiyoshi on their professional relationship. We asked them how their connection as advisor and student, and mentor and mentee has affected their careers. Their answers help illuminate the connection researchers form in a lab and how that affects the future of their careers and research. Read on below to learn more, including how they both reacted to a comment about using up too much of the lab’s funding!
First up, Dr. Biggins.
Sue Biggins, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
Biggins Laboratory
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Can you speak a little about your work and the work you and Dr. Bungo Akiyoshi performed when you were his Ph.D. advisor?
I wanted to purify kinetochores so that we could reconstitute kinetochore-microtubule attachments and put them under tension. My original goal was to understand how the Aurora B protein kinase was regulated depending on the state of the kinetochore-microtubule attachments. Bungo spent a couple of years optimizing conditions and then we collaborated with Chip Asbury’s lab to do the biophysics. This led us to a surprising discovery that tension could directly stabilize attachments. Bungo also exploited the ability to purify kinetochores to do many other things, such as begin electron microscopy work to look at the way kinetochores attach to microtubules. His work really opened up doors for us in many exciting areas and has created a lot of new projects.
You nominated Dr. Akiyoshi for the R.R. Bensley Award for Cell biology. Why was it important for you to nominate him for this honor?
He is a great example of how a student can be fearless and highly motivated to tackle a difficult project and make it work. I wanted him to be recognized for his motivation and foresight to think about the most important questions in the field and figure out the way to tackle the question, even if it meant starting a new method.
Congratulations on your nomination to the National Academy of Sciences and your appointment of Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Will you continue to work with Ph.D. students or postdocs in your work?
I plan to continue working with both Ph.D. students and postdocs in the future- I think they both have unique things to offer to science and how we think about problems. The most important thing to me is to have people who are excited to identify the most interesting questions in our field and who are motivated and not afraid to try things to address those questions- this happens with both post-docs and grad students and just depends on the personality.
What do you like best about working with Postdocs and Ph.D. Students?
I think they both have unique things to offer. Postdocs are confident about what problem they want to address and how they want to tackle it. This brings a great strength to their work. They are also able to provide great guidance for the grad students. The raw enthusiasm and motivation of students also adds a lot to the lab environment-they often don’t have preconceived notions about how things should turn out, so it helps them be fearless about trying things and to think about problems in unique ways.
What advice can you give to early investigators?
Try to balance taking risks with doing things that you know will work to move the field forward. It is often hard to try new things but it is essential to science moving forward. But it is important to rely on your strengths to make sure you continue to make progress. I also think it is important to run the lab the way it works for you. Many people will give advice about how to run your lab, but in the end you need to go with your gut feeling about who will work well with your guidance and what projects are the ones you care most about working on.
Next up, Dr. Akiyoshi.
Bungo Akiyoshi, Ph.D.
Group Leader
Akiyoshi Lab
University of Oxford
Can you speak a little about your work and the work you and Dr. Sue Biggins performed when she was your Ph.D. advisor?
I am interested in understanding how cells accurately transmit their genetic material (i.e. chromosomes) to offspring. This process is mediated by the kinetochore, a macromolecular protein complex that assembles onto the centromere and interacts with spindle microtubules to separate duplicated chromosomes during mitosis. Fascinated by the beauty of kinetochores, I joined Sue's lab in 2005 to better understand the mechanism of chromosome segregation. At that time, nobody knew how to purify kinetochores from any organism, which greatly hindered the study of kinetochores. So Sue told me that "if we could develop a method to isolate kinetochores, we would be able to obtain lots of new insights into this interesting molecular machine". I really liked her idea and decided to work on this project for my Ph.D research. After several years of trials and errors, I managed to purify kinetochores from yeast, which allowed us to reconstitute kinetochore-microtubule interactions in vitro for the first time.
My current work is still on the kinetochore, although I now study it from a bit of a different angle. It was widely assumed that all eukaryotes utilize a common set of proteins to build kinetochores, but I recently discovered that an unconventional type of kinetochore proteins is used in trypanosomes. I am characterizing these proteins to understand how trypanosomes manage to carry out the same kinetochore functions (i.e. to interact with DNA and microtubules) using different type of proteins.
During the time that Dr. Biggins was your Ph.D. advisor what experiences helped solidify your relationship. Did you travel to meetings together, write papers, what research did you perform?
To develop a method to purify kinetochores, I had to use a lot of expensive reagents. Indeed, during the first two years in Sue's lab, all I was doing was growing lots of yeast cells and trying to find a condition to purify kinetochores. Then there was a lab meeting where a postdoc commented that "When will you give up your project? I am worried that you will use up all the lab's funding soon". This was shocking to me and I don't remember how I responded to it. But Sue just laughed and did not say anything. I interpreted it as if she was saying "just carry on". After two years of trials and errors, I managed to purify kinetochores for the first time. Sue's encouragement and support made it possible!
How has your relationship with Dr. Biggins affected the trajectory of your career?
Thanks to Sue's supervision and training, I was getting quite confident in surviving in science by the time I was about to obtain my Ph.D. This prompted me to pursue whatever project I thought would be the most interesting for my postdoc research (no matter how difficult it might be), which led to the discovery of unconventional kinetochores in trypanosomes. Without the confidence I gained in Sue's lab, I probably would not have started working on trypanosomes.
Do you currently work with Ph.D. students or postdocs in a similar way to how Dr. Biggins worked with you? If so, what have you learned from your former mentor?
This is a difficult question. I started my group only recently and am still learning how to supervise people in my group. One important lesson I learned from Sue was to be patient. It is amazing that she was willing to wait for two years before seeing the success in the kinetochore purification project.
We were able to interview both Drs. Biggins and Akiyoshi on their professional relationship. We asked them how their connection as advisor and student, and mentor and mentee has affected their careers. Their answers help illuminate the connection researchers form in a lab and how that affects the future of their careers and research. Read on below to learn more, including how they both reacted to a comment about using up too much of the lab’s funding!
First up, Dr. Biggins.
Sue Biggins, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
Biggins Laboratory
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Can you speak a little about your work and the work you and Dr. Bungo Akiyoshi performed when you were his Ph.D. advisor?
I wanted to purify kinetochores so that we could reconstitute kinetochore-microtubule attachments and put them under tension. My original goal was to understand how the Aurora B protein kinase was regulated depending on the state of the kinetochore-microtubule attachments. Bungo spent a couple of years optimizing conditions and then we collaborated with Chip Asbury’s lab to do the biophysics. This led us to a surprising discovery that tension could directly stabilize attachments. Bungo also exploited the ability to purify kinetochores to do many other things, such as begin electron microscopy work to look at the way kinetochores attach to microtubules. His work really opened up doors for us in many exciting areas and has created a lot of new projects.
You nominated Dr. Akiyoshi for the R.R. Bensley Award for Cell biology. Why was it important for you to nominate him for this honor?
He is a great example of how a student can be fearless and highly motivated to tackle a difficult project and make it work. I wanted him to be recognized for his motivation and foresight to think about the most important questions in the field and figure out the way to tackle the question, even if it meant starting a new method.
Congratulations on your nomination to the National Academy of Sciences and your appointment of Investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Will you continue to work with Ph.D. students or postdocs in your work?
I plan to continue working with both Ph.D. students and postdocs in the future- I think they both have unique things to offer to science and how we think about problems. The most important thing to me is to have people who are excited to identify the most interesting questions in our field and who are motivated and not afraid to try things to address those questions- this happens with both post-docs and grad students and just depends on the personality.
What do you like best about working with Postdocs and Ph.D. Students?
I think they both have unique things to offer. Postdocs are confident about what problem they want to address and how they want to tackle it. This brings a great strength to their work. They are also able to provide great guidance for the grad students. The raw enthusiasm and motivation of students also adds a lot to the lab environment-they often don’t have preconceived notions about how things should turn out, so it helps them be fearless about trying things and to think about problems in unique ways.
What advice can you give to early investigators?
Try to balance taking risks with doing things that you know will work to move the field forward. It is often hard to try new things but it is essential to science moving forward. But it is important to rely on your strengths to make sure you continue to make progress. I also think it is important to run the lab the way it works for you. Many people will give advice about how to run your lab, but in the end you need to go with your gut feeling about who will work well with your guidance and what projects are the ones you care most about working on.
Next up, Dr. Akiyoshi.
Bungo Akiyoshi, Ph.D.
Group Leader
Akiyoshi Lab
University of Oxford
Can you speak a little about your work and the work you and Dr. Sue Biggins performed when she was your Ph.D. advisor?
I am interested in understanding how cells accurately transmit their genetic material (i.e. chromosomes) to offspring. This process is mediated by the kinetochore, a macromolecular protein complex that assembles onto the centromere and interacts with spindle microtubules to separate duplicated chromosomes during mitosis. Fascinated by the beauty of kinetochores, I joined Sue's lab in 2005 to better understand the mechanism of chromosome segregation. At that time, nobody knew how to purify kinetochores from any organism, which greatly hindered the study of kinetochores. So Sue told me that "if we could develop a method to isolate kinetochores, we would be able to obtain lots of new insights into this interesting molecular machine". I really liked her idea and decided to work on this project for my Ph.D research. After several years of trials and errors, I managed to purify kinetochores from yeast, which allowed us to reconstitute kinetochore-microtubule interactions in vitro for the first time.
My current work is still on the kinetochore, although I now study it from a bit of a different angle. It was widely assumed that all eukaryotes utilize a common set of proteins to build kinetochores, but I recently discovered that an unconventional type of kinetochore proteins is used in trypanosomes. I am characterizing these proteins to understand how trypanosomes manage to carry out the same kinetochore functions (i.e. to interact with DNA and microtubules) using different type of proteins.
During the time that Dr. Biggins was your Ph.D. advisor what experiences helped solidify your relationship. Did you travel to meetings together, write papers, what research did you perform?
To develop a method to purify kinetochores, I had to use a lot of expensive reagents. Indeed, during the first two years in Sue's lab, all I was doing was growing lots of yeast cells and trying to find a condition to purify kinetochores. Then there was a lab meeting where a postdoc commented that "When will you give up your project? I am worried that you will use up all the lab's funding soon". This was shocking to me and I don't remember how I responded to it. But Sue just laughed and did not say anything. I interpreted it as if she was saying "just carry on". After two years of trials and errors, I managed to purify kinetochores for the first time. Sue's encouragement and support made it possible!
How has your relationship with Dr. Biggins affected the trajectory of your career?
Thanks to Sue's supervision and training, I was getting quite confident in surviving in science by the time I was about to obtain my Ph.D. This prompted me to pursue whatever project I thought would be the most interesting for my postdoc research (no matter how difficult it might be), which led to the discovery of unconventional kinetochores in trypanosomes. Without the confidence I gained in Sue's lab, I probably would not have started working on trypanosomes.
Do you currently work with Ph.D. students or postdocs in a similar way to how Dr. Biggins worked with you? If so, what have you learned from your former mentor?
This is a difficult question. I started my group only recently and am still learning how to supervise people in my group. One important lesson I learned from Sue was to be patient. It is amazing that she was willing to wait for two years before seeing the success in the kinetochore purification project.
