Dr. Sanaz Memarzadeh
Steps into the U Magazine Spotlight
Since she was a very young girl, Sanaz Memarzadeh, MD (RES ’00, FEL ’03), PhD ’08, could not imagine a life without science. “Maybe since I was, like, 3 or 4 years old,” she says. “I really think I was meant to do this.” There are other passions in her life, to be sure: dancing, music, sports. But science and medicine take primacy. That passion is her North Star as a physician-scientist, working as an oncologic surgeon in the operating room to cure ovarian cancer and as a researcher in the lab to understand why it so often comes back and to reveal the mechanisms to keep that from happening. “My life’s goal,” Dr. Memarzadeh says, “is to make sure that when we treat a patient with ovarian cancer, we eradicate the cancer, and if a woman is facing relapse, we provide treatments that can eliminate the cancer so that it does not come back again.”
When did you first start to think about science?
As a little kid growing up in Iran, I loved taking a seed and watching it grow to become a plant. To me that was a wonderful scientific project. Most of the girls would play with Barbies and other toys, but I was really interested in doing experiments. I was very much into mathematics, but I decided early on that I had an interest in medicine and that I wanted to pursue that track.
What was your first experiment?
I think my first experiment in a laboratory setting was as a neuroscience major at the University of Pittsburgh. It was a procedure called patch clamping — it was kind of amazing that the professor trusted me, as an undergraduate, to work in his lab — in which I would take little neurons that we had grown and put a small electrode into them, and then give them drugs and measure electrical activity. It was a complex experiment, but I was so determined that I figured out how to do it.
What has been your greatest challenge in your work?
It is very critical for physician-scientists to be able to balance their time, in terms of their clinical activities and their research. That can be a challenge, and striking that balance has become more difficult in recent years. I don’t really know why that is — it surprises me. I’m still trying to figure it out.
Where does your inspiration come from?
My patients are my inspiration. I am struck by the bravery of the women who are facing these diagnoses, who come to me diagnosed with ovarian and some forms of aggressive endometrial cancer, they receive chemotherapy, they receive surgery, and we’re happy when we think the disease is in remission. But the reality is that in the majority of those cases I know the cancer will come back. And often my patients fear that, too.
Who is your science hero?
Rosalind Franklin. She was a woman scientist who was part of the team whose work led to the discovery of DNA being a double helix. She was the X-ray crystallographer, working with two men, James Watson and Francis Crick, and they were the ones who got all the glory and she got very little credit in her lifetime. But the pictures that she took were essential to understanding the molecular structure of DNA. She died at a young age, from ovarian cancer. I keep a photograph of her on my desk.
Where are you happiest?
I’m very happy when I spend time with my little doggie. That’s really relaxing and a lovely thing to do. I’m happy when I’m in the operating room and a surgery is going smoothly and everyone is in their zone doing their thing and the patient has a good outcome. I’m happy when I’m talking with my colleagues about science and we’re discussing a complex problem, but we feel that we are finding solutions and we’re moving the science forward.
What do you consider to be your finest achievement?
I don’t think I’ve had a finest achievement. I’m my own biggest critic, and I always think I could do better and that there’s more that I can do.
What are the qualities of a great scientist?
Perseverance and the determination to not give up. That’s one of the first things I learned as a PhD student — your experiments don’t always work, but you have to just keep going. And also being collaborative, because no one can do everything by themselves. It’s critical that you work with others, engage the best minds that are around you in the science. And, of course, curiosity. You have to be curious to do science.
What characteristic most defines you?
Persistence. I don’t give up. I’m trying to solve ovarian cancer, and I’m not going to give up until we do.
What is your greatest virtue?
Honesty, I think.
What is your greatest fault?
I’m a workaholic. At least my family thinks I am.
What is your motto?
Don’t give up.
What do you value most in your colleagues and/or your students?
I think it is the passion all of them bring to their work and, particularly among my clinical colleagues in pathology and radiology and medical and radiation oncology, the caring they have for the patients. I really value that. Among my science colleagues, it is, in addition to their tremendous expertise, their dedication to clinical translation. And my students and my lab team of scientists, it is their honesty, their curiosity and their willingness to work hard and desire to advance the field.
When do you not think about science?
If I’m being really honest, I’m either thinking about science or I’m thinking about my patients. The two are connected; my brain almost always is thinking of one or the other.
What is your most treasured possession?
A statuette of a Greek laurel wreath that was given to me by a patient with ovarian cancer. She said to me, “I hope you solve this problem. I hope you are the one who makes this discovery.” I thought it was a beautiful gift, and I have kept it in my office ever since.
To which superhero do you most relate?
Honestly, that’s not something that I think about. But I do think that we’re surrounded by super human beings. It could be a nurse or a medical assistant, a scheduling team or a scribe — people who care deeply about what they do and about others.
What are you most compulsive about?
Everything. I’m just a compulsive person.
What is the best moment in your day?
The times when I can go for a run in the morning, because it helps me clear my mind. And at the same time, it’s also when I can think through problems more clearly.
What is your definition of happiness?
Having personal peace.
What’s your definition of misery?
Conflict and combat.
What book has inspired you?
This is going to sound very geeky, but it’s Robbins and Cotran’s Pathologic Basis of Disease. This is a book that I read cover-to-cover two or three times during medical school. And I love this book because it’s about pathology, but it’s also about pathophysiology of a disease. It breaks down each disease into the basics, and then how the cells look and what the processes are. And I just love that. It’s what I love about medicine and science.
