Akın Deniz Heper
Yale-NUS College
Singapore (1.3° N, 103.8° E)

featuring Zeynep Dereli Korkut, Postdoctoral Fellow, Houston Methodist Research Institute, Houston (29.7° N, 95.3° W)

Zeynep Dereli Korkut is a postdoctoral fellow at Houston Methodist Research Institute, where she specializes in cancer research and currently works on an image-based proteomics platform to predict drug response in cancer. While earning her doctorate at the City University of New York, she developed the Z-Chip, a device that allows for ex vivo drug testing (i.e., drug testing on tissue rather than a living patient). She co-founded VivoZ Biolabs LLC, a New York company based on marketing the Z-Chip, and entered the business world for a while, though nowadays she mostly focuses on her current position in Houston.

Throughout our interview, I personally connected with much of what Ms. Dereli Korkut told me shaped her journey. We discussed how she got to her current position in research and business, starting with her parents and academic life before she got to the United States. Her parents opened up the possibility of attending university abroad and encouraged her toward intellectual growth, which is my experience with my parents as well—their effect in making me reach out, outside of the limits of my home country, is undeniable. Similarly, she talked about not having had a single mentor but rather a number of experienced people she could take lessons from. This is, again, my experience; while I cannot deny the role of some people in my decisions, I cannot reduce everything down to a single person or even a few people. Many people have shaped me by providing a variety of perspectives, not by telling me what I should or should not do. As such, no single one would have had an effect without the existence of another.

Ms. Dereli Korkut’s account of how VivoZ Biolabs LLC started also reminded me of many of the projects I have worked on. In many cases, my contribution or the end result of the project was not something I had been planning on doing, but rather things that I ended up doing by taking the opportunities presented to me. Her account gave me a sense of ease about this, as the typical examples of very successful people are that they are driven and goal-oriented individuals who have had a specific idea of what they wanted to do since childhood—which is very much in contrast with who I am. I was reminded that it is okay to take one thing at a time and figure out where you will end up as you go.

Overall, Ms. Dereli Korkut’s experience really resonated with me. Her experience with her family, her perspective in making choices, and her focus on happiness over material gains are things I believe I share with her. I also agree with her advice that internships not only create strong resumes but also help students decide what to focus on, academically and vocationally. Ms. Dereli Korkut’s story shows that taking opportunities as you see them and working to do your best at each turn will bring you success, happiness, and self-satisfaction.

Highlights from the Interview

How did you get to where you are? How would you describe your educational background and career path?

I studied molecular biology and genetics in college. It was very popular at the time. I didn’t have any idea about the details of them or any other field, but what I knew was that I really wanted to do research. Whatever it is that I would study, I wanted to do research, and I wanted to stay in academic life. Those were the two criteria for me.

I had great teachers, but some of them were not well prepared for the world needs of our field. They were keeping the courses very rigid, so we were all worried about our grades and our GPA, which I didn’t like at all. But over those years, I always went abroad to participate in internships at different labs. Internships are the best thing to really see what you want to do, and whether you like it or not. Or whether it fits to you. You may like it, but it may not fit to you. I mean it depends on you—whether you like something, you really work hard, and you’re okay to give your all—because you like it. If your own personality and abilities fit with your level of the thing, then it gives amazing results.

In 2005, I moved to New York City. I completed my PhD in biomedical engineering at the University of New York. My research was on BioMEMS technologies. I’m not sure whether you’ve ever heard of that. I am more of an engineer and designer and developer. I started to design microbiology devices for anti-cancer drug screening. It was a very successful time for me. I was able to publish a few papers, and we had a patent for the product that I developed, and we founded a biotechnology company as the result. For two years I worked with the company. I was leading the company actually, because there was no one else, just me and my [doctorate] advisors. There were two of them. We were looking for investors and funding, and we were able to find those, basic level funding. The company is still active in New York City, but I am a partner now. I’m not directly working for the company, as I needed to move to Houston because of my husband’s new position at MD Anderson Cancer institute. In my current position at Houston Methodist Research Institute, I work on glioblastoma, one type of brain tumor, which is lethal, and I am trying to characterize patient glioblastoma samples. I’m trying to develop new models to do direct testing on them. I’m again trying to develop a new technology which is called image-based proteomics platform to get as much information possible for all of the slide cultures of GBMs.

Did you have someone you looked up to? A mentor or someone whose advice really helped you get to where you are?

Not one person, I would say. But in high school or in college or during PhD, there were different people who were kind of … not mentoring… because it was not something formal. You admire them. You like the way they live, and then if you’re in communication with them, whatever they say, you filter it out for yourself the way you want. I had a couple of people like that during my lifetime actually. This is a very nice question, because if you want to do research, you will definitely have a mentor. Your official, formal mentor is very, very critical for your future. And unfortunately, sometimes you are not able to select one. If you ever have chance to select your mentors, please be careful. Ask the previous mentees, and see the pedigree of their environment. Where do those people move on to after their relationship with that mentor? Because some mentors can be very destructive. Some mentors can be very supportive. And it all depends on people’s own self-confidence. So definitely be picky about a selecting mentor, if you have the chance. Sometimes, because you are getting accepted to a specific project and if the mentor is there, you cannot say that you do not want this mentor, but that’s very important.

Before we talk about what you do right now, I want to ask you about Vivoz Biolabs. That was the company that you cofounded, based on a patent which was, in rough terms, ex vivo mimicking the human environment in order to test cancer drugs. Can you elaborate on what made you go in that direction? What made you want to specialize on ex vivo environment creation? How did that lead to a company?

It was completely unplanned. When I started my PhD, I would have never thought that I would form a company at the end based on the project I did. When the device we developed worked very well, the university technology office approached us to support us, they told us, “Why don’t you transfer your technology from research to the marketplace? And then people can use it if they need.” At that time, there were some grants coming out from the National Science Foundation and the National Health Institute. They were all really pushing in that direction. We applied for those grants and we got them. They took us to trainings for some time. Stanford, UCSF, NYU, short-term trainings, and I really enjoyed it. Some people enjoy more basic science—they are trying to understand the nature or understand different phenomena—but I’m not like that. I like to work on applicable things. I like to design and have a product at the end. I like to see if it works or not. After those trainings, they told us don’t finalize the project or technology without knowing what outside world needs—because you can start with something and you can end up with another thing if you really know what people need. So at that time, we started to see a lot of other things in the field. We were interviewing with them; I enjoyed that part a lot as well. At the end of that short period of training, because that training’s purpose was to let us know whether we could build a company or not, we said ok we can have an initial goal for a company. I’m glad that I did because I learned a lot. It gave me another perspective, broadened it, and there’s no one way of doing something. The Vivoz Biolab is active now. When I work on something, I still think of having a company or having a product from that. I feel more confident now, because I know how to start it. I like to work with people who are nice and smart. I learn a lot from them. We had few grants and publications in a short period of time. There was huge media coverage about our product, and then we won an award for this product.

How was the transition from research to the commercial market for you?

It was fitting to my personality very well. For me, it was easy transition. But for some people—they don’t want to do that, they don’t like to be in contact with people as much. They are more introverted. But for me, it was very natural. I didn’t have any strategy or any plan for that, it happened.

Can you tell me more about what you’re doing right now?

I work in a hospital research institute. They have collaborators at University of Washington in Seattle. I started on the more biological part of the project, which is good. I learned a lot about the human brain and human tumors. I designed a new project for imaging and computational imaging base, for being able to predict, because GBM is a very heterogeneous tumor from person to person or within the person. It doesn’t give you any specific character that you can target at it. So that’s why it’s a very difficult case. With the technique I’m trying to develop, I’m hopeful that I could get as much information from one slice of GBM. Maybe in the future, we can automate it, using our tissue screening platform, but not in the short term.

Is your work more towards diagnostics rather than anti-drug testing nowadays?

Not diagnostics. It is kind of—people can use it for diagnostics, maybe. But our purpose is to really understand the GBM tissues and combine it with all the information to be able to understand which drugs will work. Make drug predictions computationally.

My next question is about the future of your field. There is definitely a future in research, but how do you think that will change? With cancer research, going forward, what do you think is the direction? Is it more nanotechnology or is it more the biochemical side of things? Do you think there will be a completely new set of skills that we can’t predict yet?

A lot of biological researchers and even engineers are starting to work on cancer because there is more funding for that. Some of them are sincerely trying to find a cure, some of them are just trying to stay active, I guess. Or that’s how I feel. And most of the people are following the same path, working on molecular biology. They are going deep down to the cellular mechanisms, or even smaller molecular mechanisms, trying to understand the molecular mechanisms. To find new agents, to target them. But another group, more importantly, is more concentrated on technology, which is very helpful I guess, but I’m sure it has to be a combination of those different fields. I’m thinking whatever we work on now may be helpful, but some people are going to come up with a totally different approach, a different concept, like the way in 1950 when they found the structure of DNA. It changed the field completely. I’m waiting for something like that, honestly. I don’t know what it is because it seems like 90 percent of people focus on one thing, and they are very small things. They cannot see the big picture. Research is something like that, the accumulation of the previous studies. When you do some research, it has to be based on previous publications or literature, which means it’s not that much independent. So if the previous publications are in the wrong direction, it shifts your direction towards them. So, I’m waiting for something very new and evolutionary, but we will see.

One thing that has been going around in media about cancer treatment has been CRISPR technology. What do you think about that, being from the field?

CRISPR technology is a very important technology. It already changed the direction of a lot of things in the research. Personally, in my view, it is not going to be the one that will revolutionize cancer research. It will give a lot of input for sure, but it’s not different than finding the PCR or cloning technologies of years ago. You know what I’m trying to say? When they came out with PCR technology, it was also very important. It all changed the direction of research, but it couldn’t solve the problem and couldn’t find the perfect treatment. CRISPR is a kind of technology, a technology that can go that way, but it is not itself the solution. But it is a very, very important technique.

Do you think cancer research, things like the device that you designed, do you think that they’re moving the bar towards cheaper, more available options, or do you think that the move is more towards higher accuracy or new ways of approaching more options?

I don’t know. I think the first thing is the validation and accuracy. I mean, it can be cheap. That is okay. But if it is not working, it has no meaning for being cheap. So it really needs to be validated and accurate. What I mean by validation is not only in animals but with, of course, patient validations. That’s the most important criteria for me. 

What advice do you have for people interested in your field?

There’s one thing—it’s not about my field or other fields—just go and see. Do internships as much as possible. Go, see and listen yourself. You can always change something you don’t like. The other thing is you will face a lot of different people. Some will be very helpful, some of them will be very harsh. Don’t let them change your mind about what you want. Because it’s going to pass. The only thing will not change is you and the relation with your own project or your own field. Always listen to yourself, whether you want it, or you can’t do it. And go do internships as much as possible. Make contact with people in the field that you want to learn from. If you can afford it, you can go to the very big labs as an intern. Maybe they don’t pay you, maybe you can work for free for a few months. It’s easier to get into big labs if you are free. But, of course, first ask for stipend. If they’re not offering still go and do it. Don’t think about it too much. That’s what I would recommend.

(Interview excerpts have been lightly edited for clarity and readability and approved by the interviewee.)