The media paints an unrealistic expectation of science, from mainstream news to niche research articles. We see results coming from labs worldwide described in such a timeless way, as though the idea was quickly generated, the experiments run, and papers soon after published. Even for those involved in the field, who know how tricky or time consuming some protocols can be, can feel this way. A paper can say that a transformation was done to generate a mutant, but how many days, weeks, months, or years did it take? All that work in designing and making the DNA insert, prepping the media, doing the transformation, testing colonies, finding out none are valid and doing it all again? Or waiting for a necessary supply to come in that is on backorder? Maybe testing a different transformation method, or seeing if an ortholog in another species is temperature sensitive and redoing everything all over again at a few degrees lower? Rarely, unless of course for a good story, are these things told. It is just the end result, the summation of this work and time that we see, which, although this is mostly all we need to be informed, can feel daunting when you have to do these things yourself. I jokingly propose there be a “total time spent” listed on each paper.
While we have these clean, futuristic, and almost debonair pictures of science in our minds, it’s never really been the case, and now any thought of that should be thrown out the window. I started my draft of this post in 2022. I was going to write about how frustrating it is that science takes so long, how different it is from what people imagine, and my own insecurities as a researcher and graduate student. Since then, the current administration has changed so much, so rapidly that the entire landscape of science and medicine within the United States is irrevocably different. There is no “here’s a little look into my work” post anymore. On top of all the ways the government and social media are dismantling the “brain gain” of the 30-50’s-ish times that established the US as a scientific powerhouse, the general public is being fed lies and misinformation about health that is tragically leading to more illness, death, and mistrust of science.
The pandemic really set the stage for anti-medicine rhetoric. I think back to how disgruntled the public acted anytime there was a new update. If new research came out, it was seen as science not knowing what they were doing, or that it was untrustworthy, as though researchers were changing their minds on a simple whim. In reality, plenty of labs were doing work, and when one got published, another probably had data that told us something new that would need further testing and to be reviewed before it could be put out into the world to be used. An article I recently read actually discussed this issue, where increased transparency leads to more distrust (Hyde 2025).
I fully understand and respect why people outside of science may feel hesitant to believe what they hear. On top of the pandemic being a scary and confusing time, the media often sensationalized the changes. Plus, not every scientist or company is in it for the right reasons. Back at SIU I had read the infamous, now retracted, “vaccines cause autism” study and was appalled at not only how poorly done the study was (from only having 12 children total involved, to the histology scoring not being blind), but also that the scientist behind it had started patent applications far prior to the release of the study! When these things hit the news, it is no surprise why there is distrust in medicine. Not to mention many people, especially women and people of colour, having unsavory encounters with physicians.
From this, I also think about how often we dream of the scientifically advanced future. And while in some aspects, science and technology have reached incredible new heights, in many ways we are still far behind what we could be. We imagine designer babies and far space exploration, but good or bad, these things are unrealistic in the near future. We see movies like Jurassic Park and think that reviving old species is a genuine possibility, when really our only genuine luck with these things typically lie with bacteria or plants at the absolute best. It is sad to say, but our rare disease cures are equally as hard to create as our major global disease cures. It’s simply not quick nor easy to figure things out, much less apply them in a way that is functional. So yay! Maybe you made a drug that inhibits some terrible bacterium or fungus. But is it toxic for humans? What are the long term effects? What is the proper dosing? Formulation or vehicle for it? There’s so much that you have to ask and study. Every advancement takes so much time and work. Every day new steps are made, but they happen so glacially in the grand scheme of things that grandiose what-if’s of science aren’t as simple. Even just hearing the phrase “cure cancer” from other pre-meds in undergrad was wildly frustrating, as though cancer is a single entity that is simple to tackle, not something with hundreds of types and causes and complications and manifestations that each need unique approaches. And now, I feel the same hearing how the government will “find a cause for autism by September” apparently.
With the current administration repealing environmental protections, unjustly terminating research grants, laying off staff involved in public health and safety, and the “health secretary” having no experience in science while actively lying to the public, we are damaging the future of the United States, and world. I could go on for a while on this topic, but I want to stress how wasteful these actions can be. My own lab lost our NIH R01 grant. The letter is below. Keep in mind, our grant was for studying cytoskeletal proteins in an invasive fungal disease. There is nothing “DEI” in our work. We then had to spend our time and school resources to get appeals made, which were all rejected. We had to rely on the school to figure out what to do about salaries and orders. For instance, this grant was supposed to cover my stipend for the rest of grad school. Now, it’s possible I will have to teach as well, instead of just focusing on the research, thus slowing its progress. In addition, more expensive experiments that can give better insights or move things along quicker are cancelled. I’ll get to spend much more time using older methods for possibly lower quality results. We are also using our time to write more grant proposals, which means generating more preliminary data instead of focusing on getting results for our should-be funded projects. One of our manuscripts that is part of our original grant is also being held off from being published in the case we need it for future proposals, further slowing science.
But this is just one grant in a still very new lab. What happens when other labs lose their funding? Well, one outcome is the loss of resources the scientific community uses. Plenty of online resources are disappearing, and as time goes on I am finding more and more of them being taken down. One such that frustrated me recently is WebMeV, which was a tool you could use to make data visualizations, like heat maps. Due to funding cuts, it was taken offline. One lab’s loss can affect the whole community.
Even before all these changes, it was hard not to feel like a failure every day for not churning out publications left and right. I am not going to go into detail of every little thing that pops up with my experiments, but it’s just the frustration of spending so much time trying to get results, only to not, and then need to be ready and energized to do it all again. I feel like I am constantly overexerting myself, but my data doesn’t always show that. Now with losing our grant and all the misinformation that comes across my social media feed, I often feel intense anger and helplessness. I sometimes will write an educated comment, only to receive intense vitriol back (and even death or doxxing threats!). Science and medicine was once trusted. Regular folk outside of science aren’t trained to know what to look for and have to rely on governmental bodies to use that data to make guidelines for health and safety. We have to do that with a lot in our lives, from trusting our mechanics to fix our cars properly to our baristas for not giving me regular milk and sending me to the bathroom for the rest of the day. Yet now, that trust is gone and complete lies and nonsense have taken hold.
I felt the need to write this as I’ve just been really frustrated lately. I mean, in the end I’m sure I’ll be perfectly fine, but I think sometimes I make it outwardly seem like I’m having a blast with everything I do even though it’s not really the case. I haven’t had time recently to workout nor practice my hobbies, and it’s mentally leaving me burned out. It’s not that I’ve been pretending, I still do find ways to enjoy life, but grad school has really bumped up a difficulty setting lately. I hope that being transparent about this at least can increase trust that scientists are trying their best to keep moving forward.
Happy reading,
-Beppa