After decades of investigating the molecular mysteries behind aging and disease, Monica Driscoll last spring faced a puzzling new problem.
How would her team of nearly two dozen researchers - comprising one of Rutgers University's largest and most prominent science labs - continue its work during Covid-19?
Driscoll, a molecular neuro-geneticist in the School of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers-New Brunswick, seeks to discover the ways in which humans might extend healthy lifespan. Her research addresses illnesses like Alzheimer's Disease and ALS and draws extensive funding from the National Institutes of Health.
It's not a job that can be handled over Zoom.
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Yet her team has worked out a system to continue experiments while respecting social distancing protocols. Researchers stagger their lab times and have spread out through Nelson Biological Laboratories, while also finding innovative ways to work online.
"We figured it out," Driscoll says. "We bring people into the lab in ways that they can avoid each other. It takes mega-organizing. But we made it work."
There are plenty of difficult days. Lab manager Mary Anne Royal had to drive home with a package of worms to ensure the sample was shipped. Lab assistant Elaine Gavin, facing disrupted supply chains, is often on the phone tracking down new sources for everyday lab materials. And at Thanksgiving, Driscoll had to forgo her tradition of bringing in a chocolate turkey, opting instead for turkey-shaped lollipops.
"Little things like that challenge our connection to one another," Driscoll said. "In a group where we have a common purpose, we work hard, but we also have fun."
The close-knit culture, which has informed the lab's success over decades, was especially vital in 2020.
"This lab is more cooperative than competitive," says Royal, who has worked with Driscoll for more than 20 years. "Faced with this incredible challenge, we did what we always do: We talk to each other, we collaborate, and we figure it out."
Driscoll, a Douglass College graduate, received her Ph.D. from Harvard University and is a Distinguished Professor of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. She did her post-doc at Columbia University, studying under 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry recipient Martin Chalfie.
"In a beautiful way she exemplifies the passion for science that we all feel," Royal says. "Monica wouldn't notice if the walls blew down in her office as long as she could keep doing science.
"This year has been all about finding the way to do what we love in spite of another hurdle."
