LUCKY WITH LOVE, FRIENDSHIP, RESEARCH, AND JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING GOOD IN LIFE!
Alberto (Tito) Nasjletti, M.D., catalyst of the Department of Pharmacology, brings people together for science and fellowship.
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It's not that he shuns the limelight.* "I just don't go looking for it," Dr. Nasjletti says, unwilling to discuss his colleagues who do. His credo dictates that fame is not what counts, only the science does. At the same time, this conviction belies the quality of his research and the esteem in which he is held by his peers, not only in pharmacology, but also in the other basic science departments. Still, even the admiration shown by the Ph.D. candidates he has mentored might leave him wanting were it not for the extraordinary friendship and support he shares with John C. McGiff, M.D., professor and chairman of the Department of Pharmacology. Their relationship is the foundation of each man's outstanding success.
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ABOVE: This Department of Pharmacology lineup comprises the present team of operatives for a longstanding NIH Program Project Grant worth more than $2.1 million. Investigating "Hormonal Control of Blood Pressure" are professors all, from left, Michal Schwartzman, Ph.D.; Alberto Nasjletti, M.D., director; Wenhui Wang, M.D.; John C. McGiff, M.D., department chair, and Nader Abraham, Ph.D. Not shown is Michael Balazy, Ph.D. |
The cardiovascular dynasty that thrives at New York Medical College has its roots in Milwaukee at the Medical College of Wisconsin, section of clinical pharmacology. In 1971, Dr. McGiff signed on as the new director about the same time that Dr. Nasjletti was completing a post-doc at the Cleveland Clinic, then a major center for hypertension research. "One of my professors told me to write Jack McGiff about a job and I did," Dr. Nasjletti says. "I remember the interview. I accepted the position without even asking what I'd get paid [$11,500]. Money wasn't important. I'd do it over again. If I could relive my life I'd do it exactly the same way."
And so began a union of intellects marked by very different personalities— the irreverent McGiff teaching the respectful Nasjletti "how to write grants and papers, and providing the opportunity to do independent work. He basically supported my research activities for one year until I got my first grants," acknowledges Dr. Nasjletti. Funding commenced with two small American Heart Association awards and an RO1 grant from the NIH for $22,000 over three years. "I've been renewing the same grant since then: ‘Hormonal Control of Blood Pressure.' It's 31 years and counting! The hormones keep changing, but the very broad title allows me to study many things," he admits, flashing his famous broad smile.
Big Leagues
The RO1 study under his direction evolved into a Program Project Grant worth more than $2.1 million, with other departmental principal investigators (P.I.) and core directors participating. Besides Dr. McGiff they are Michal Schwartzman, Ph.D., and Wenhui Wang, M.D., P.I.s; and Nader Abraham, Ph.D., and Michael Balazy, Ph.D., core directors. A regular RO1 research grant, "Vasoactive Hormones and Blood Pressure Regulation," provides Nasjletti with another $438,000.
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ABOVE: Meet Max Bernard Nasjletti, nearly two—Dr. Nasjletti's first grandchild and the major rival to the long hours he spends in the laboratory. |
Argentina's Loss
Alberto Nasjletti married his high school sweetheart in 1967, five years after they met at a relative's wedding. One year later, they were on their way to the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for the post-doc, never to return for morethan a visit to the Argentina of their birth. They have two children. Gabriella is studying for a master's degree in education at Bank Street Teachers College in New York City. Alex, who works in information services at the New York Mercantile Exchange, and daughter-in-law Meridith are the parents of Max Bernard, born September 25, 2003. Pictures of the first Nasjletti grandchild are available upon request.
"Kitty and I came from San Juan, a small town on the Argentine side of the Andes Mountains with maybe 100,000 people. Even with a million people it would have been a small town," he smiles, but then grimaces. "Actually, thousands of people died when the city was largely destroyed by an earthquake in 1944."
"…the chance is always there to discover a new world. I feel this every time we do a truly new experiment. It is wiping the room of darkness and filling it with light."
His father owned a small clothing shop, where his mother worked afternoons. "I was never inclined to pursue a scientific career, but two of my uncles were physicians," says Dr. Nasjletti, surmising they must have provided the inspiration. Following the Argentine system, he went directly to medical school after high school. "I had a job as a teaching assistant in the department of physiology, and I participated in the research activities. I was very lucky that my introduction to science was from the head of the department, Juan Fasciolo, an internationally known scientist in hypertension…
"It was the 1960s and after Peron, there was quite a bit of social and political upheaval. We were acutely aware of how dangerous the world was, but in the department I worked in there was a large group of people who were very bright and very liberal—not easy to be in a country governed by the military. We spent the time not only on science, but on a vigorous exchange of political and social ideas. I thought it was wonderful…By the time I graduated I had decided I would not practice medicine, but spend my life in research," says Dr. Nasjletti.
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ABOVE: Among the six scientists who assist Dr. Nasjletti in his regulation of blood pressure research are Frank Zhang, M.D., Ph.D., sitting, assistant professor of pharmacology, and Huan Deng, right, Ph.D. candidate, who are both from China. They use the myograph device to study how contraction of renal arteries is modulated by various vasoactive substances. Here the subject is the enzyme cytochrome P450 2E1, which manufactures 19R HETE that attenuates the response of arteries to constrictor factors such as the hormones vasopressin and angiotensin II. |
He references luck again, which he holds responsible for every event that goes his way. Oscar Carretero, a coworker from his job in medical school, had preceded Dr. Nasjletti at the Cleveland Clinic. He introduced his colleague to George Masson, who offered Dr. Nasjletti a post-doc job in his laboratory. "I did very well, learned a lot, published good work and established connections with researchers in the hypertension community," says Dr. Nasjletti. "I started looking for a job and actually was offered a position in the nephrology division at the University of Iowa, but they wanted me to first spend time seeing patients. Uh-uh, no. That is when I heard from Jack McGiff."
Spared of a clinical concentration, Dr. Nasjletti began a total immersion in science that has never waned. "All my life I've been focused on my work," he says. "I have few friends, professionally and socially, and I'm a square person…But in science, we don't live in a vacuum. We are subjected to the influence of many different people because of their work— and especially by those in the institution where we work. That is very important. I've been lucky in the sense that I've worked with a number of good people and we helped each other…
"Jack interested me in prostaglandins. He had evidence that the formation of prostaglandins was influenced by kinins. I had worked with kinins in Argentina. Over the years all of us in the scientific community became interested in nitric oxide. Miki Schwartzman and Jack influenced me to look at the metabolism of arachadonic acid and its eicosanoid metabolites…When I began working I thought what I knew could explain everything. That's a sign of pure ignorance. Great scientists can see through lead and take short cuts, but most of us have to rely on trial and error…
"You begin doing experiments and 99 percent turn out wrong, but you learn and you keep doing them. The driving force is the questions you ask and the results you get. Most of the time our hypotheses are wrong, but the chance is always there to discover a new world. I feel this every time we do a truly new experiment. It is wiping the room of darkness and filling it with light. And that's the reason I do this— not for the glory, not because I want to see my name in print or be a department chair. It's for self-fulfillment."
Teaching, too
"You also get to work with interesting people," he continues, "young people whom you can help train, and in a university environment, which is a privilege. What we do here constitutes the fabric of civilized life—over and above how many papers you publish and how many grants you get. And on top of it all, you make a living out of it. It's a pretty good life."
Dr. Nasjletti has written 190 papers and mentored 32 post-doctoral fellows and Ph.D. students, 20 of them at New York Medical College. His CV weighs in with a long list of NIH, American Heart Association and other appointments, and he enjoys his role as the current editor of the American Journal of Physiology: Heart and Circulatory Physiology.
"I've been lucky to have had very good students. This is the point. Whatever success I've had in my career is to a large extent determined by the beneficial influence of my colleagues and the students who have worked in my lab," he declares.
The next question is a loaded one: Where does he go from here? Dr. Nasjletti recognizes the opening and takes it: "I'm not waiting for Jack McGiff to step out and disappear so I can be his replacement. I'm not interested in being a department chair. I'm well aware of my strengths and weaknesses and I know what I am—a good solid scientist who more often than not has been right, not particularly innovative and not likely to win a Nobel Prize. But I am highly respected by my fellow scientists and to me, that's probably the greatest satisfaction."