Research Frontiers
Chapter 2, Part 5

Obstacles and Challenges

Although Dr. Cattaneo certainly enjoys the rewards of being a part of an HD research team, she emphasizes that she and her coworkers face numerous obstacles. The intense pressure and time constraints that accompany HD research force the researchers to live demanding and hectic lifestyles. Because the lab is part of an HD coalition that meets every six months, as well as other organizations that meet regularly, the Cattaneo lab is expected to maintain constant progress. The labs in the coalition are the best in the world and Dr. Cattaneo said she feels pressure to live up to high expectations. She confesses that she is usually unable to sleep the night before coalition meetings because the excitement and pressure are great.

In order to be able to report new results every six months, members of the lab cannot afford to waste any time. They generally arrive at the lab at 8:30 am and leave between 9:00 pm and 11:00 pm. If they leave at 6 pm, they consider it a half-day. Furthermore, they do not take weekends off. As researcher Chiara Zuccato put it, "There are twenty-four hours in a day - I need to sleep about seven hours and it takes over an hour to get to and from work. For pretty much the rest of the day, I´m in the lab." Dr. Cattaneo has two children and it is very hard for her to spend so much time away from them. Luckily, it is an Italian way of life to have support from the family and her mother-in-law helps take care of the children.

Many people are not able to handle the pace of this lifestyle, and it is not uncommon for researchers to leave the lab after a year or two. Ironically, Dr. Cattaneo enjoys her work so much that it is hard for her to be away from the lab. The last time she took a vacation she got up very early every morning before her family woke up to check her e-mail and maintain correspondence with the lab.

A big obstacle in Italian academia is the lack of available jobs. Currently, the government is attempting to abolish assistant professorships. If this happens, even individuals with many qualifications will not be able to find positions within academic settings. An individual could be highly prolific for fifteen years and make significant research discoveries and still not be able to advance in the field. This situation in the US would be equivalent to post doctoral students never being able to become professors. Dr. Cattaneo sees this lack of job positions as an obstacle because it will be even harder to recruit new people into her lab.

Because the lab uses stem cells and there are numerous ethical issues surrounding stem cells, it has encountered a few obstacles in the form of religious and political interference. (For a concise discussion on stem cell ethics, click here.) However, members of the lab believe that this problem is a result of the public being misinformed. They believe that once the public better understands stem cell research this issue will no longer be an obstacle.

Another obstacle arises when the researchers must decide whether they should devote to making an old experiment more complete or whether they should devote time to starting a new experiment. On one hand, they want the experiment to be completely thorough. On the other hand, their minds are racing with new ideas and they want to start new experiments. This situation is worsened by the fact that it is difficult for the researchers to satisfy both their curiosities and their own expectations. In one instance, Zuccato had already written and submitted a paper about an experiment when she realized that there was something missing. Despite having a ton of other things to do, she immediately stopped submission of the paper and decided to redo the entire experiment with added conditions to make it more thorough. Thus, for researchers, it is a constant struggle to balance thoroughness with productivity.

Surprisingly, Dr. Cattaneo explains that money is not normally a major obstacle for her lab, because it is supported by many sources, including the University of Milan, the European community, and many American foundations. Happily, for at least the next four years, there is adequate funding. Dr. Cattaneo is very thankful for this: she points out that "research always begets new research," and funding is crucial for exploring new possibilities.

Last Modified: 04/12/2007

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