a vivir que se chocan los planetasss: should I stay or should I go?

Stazione di Povo con los graffitis y la Vigolana, stay or go

I'm here at my desk. It's dark, I hear the man vacuuming on the other side of the door. My neck is blocked, but today is Monday. On Monday I do aerial silks in Pergine and I can stretch my neck. I like Mondays because I get to the lab early, with the feeling of fulfilment from the weekend, and I stay until I catch the train to Pergine. While waiting for the train, I call my mother, and then walk to the aerial silks gym. I climb the silks with no pressure. It's a whole day for my research, my family, my body.

No masks at work anymore in a beautiful shared office

I love DNA and I love mountains, but, what is the limit between "professional" curiosity and "hobby" curiosity? Are there different kind of curiosities? For me, it's extremely hard to distinguish, so here I am. What should I focus my research on? Should I stay on cancer genetics or go to glacial biology?

Foto de la muestra de Matteo Pavana en Bolzano, L'eco dei ghiacciai, se ven las crioconitas que son los puntos negros donde se acumula tierra y polvo, se derrite el hielo y puede alojar vida

Trenitalia 16131, 17 minutes late. It's the first time the train to Pergine is late. I feel relaxed and I continue writing.

Dog in a climbing crag, relaxed, or bored?

The controller didn't say anything about my non-FFP2 mask, non me ne frega niente, neanche lui. What matters to me the most is my future research topic. Cancer genetics or glacial biology? Do I stay on my current field, studying the fascinating process of how normal cells become cancerous, or do I try to change to a completely new topic: how life grows on glaciers?

Pintura abajo de un árbol ilustrando le Tre Cime di Lavaredo o il Sassolungo, no sé, vida

The point is whether to specialize and go deep in a topic or to continue exploring broad. At some point we all should become specialists, otherwise, you do not focus enough in a topic and you remain too wide. Why is this negative? Because you never reach the point in which you really dived deep into a problem and know all the insignificant details of an issue, and are able to push the limits of what we know about it. Think about anything you have been doing for at least 10 years (minimum practice of 2 hours a day), you became an expert on that (working as a lawyer, playing tennis or parenting).

Advices from Dr. Rosenberg to progress in research:
*immersion in the problem
*focus on the goal https://t.co/kZaA3U6qNu
— Julieta Rivosecchi (@jurivosecchi) May 13, 2022

The pioneer in cancer immunotherapy, Dr. Rosenberg, not only highlighted these two aspects (immersion and focus) during his conference, but he also emphasized that we must attend seminars on different fields, learn as much as we can, broaden our knowledge to progress in research. In his recent comment paper, plant biologist Sophien Kamoun, strongly argued to not to hyperspecialize! : 1) build expertise in multiple areas to develop an antifragile profile; 2) be generous in our learning efforts; 3) Just do it, anything. Beautiful, mainly the last one.

What you see is a mechanical engineer gardening

More and more scientists are moving to the environment field, and funding for molecular ecology are increasing in the last years. What is clear for me? It's clear that I love molecular biology and in particular DNA, how it is organized in the cell, how it interacts with proteins, how the environment can change the expression of the DNA, and ultimately how our way of living impacts our genetic expression. I love all these tiny things occurring unceasingly in our cells, and their link with the decisions we take.

What is true for me? It is true that when not working on molecules, I'm in the mountains. They are part of my life, they are part of me. I can not explain in better words how important mountains are for me. Even if inanimate or inert for most of the people, they move, they breathe, they live for me.

El Palon del Bondone, #mirestoenbondon

What is not clear for me? It is not clear whether to follow the interest and curiosity of my heart, or to continue growing as a researcher in the field I currently am. Mountains seem to be a passion, a hobby, I am not sure whether I should focus my research on them. In August, I will take the training course of my life at the EMBL (European Molecular Biology Laboratory): I will learn how to study the insects and microorganisms that live on glaciers, by studying the small pieces of DNA they leave on glaciers. This is the kind of things I could do as a molecular biologist in the environment field, molecular ecology. We basically take samples from any place in the environment such as lakes, soil, glaciers, and we then analyse the DNA content and find to what species they belong. We can compare samples from different moments and track how the presence of species evolve with seasons/years/climate change. It is not clear for me whether I will move to this new field or not, but for sure this new knowledge will help me to build my path, together with the infinite amount of virtual and online courses I already completed. Anyway, what contribution could I make? Do they need me? Who knows.

What is not true for me? That even if determined, I've never been single-minded. I'm hybrid, I love my research topic, I love my sport, I love my country and my language, but I love more to explore new ones. So, I probably have to accept that I will always face changes in career, sports and places to live. I guess the cleverness is to transform this aspect of me in a strength and not in a weakness.

The kind of things my mother sends me when I tell her I feel tired

What I think and hope it could happen: I will finish my period as a cancer geneticist in Trento, I will, in parallel, attend courses and learn about molecular ecology of alpine environments and then move to a new postdoc project still on cancer. Then in the future, when I will be an established scientist, if I ever will, I will have the opportunity to focus and apply my expertise on molecular biology to questions related to alpine environments, ideally combining my interests, I hope.

What it will happen: I don't know. I can only do things, anything.