E52: Carl G. Hartman Award with Dr. Teresa K. Woodruff

It's a mini lab reunion! Yu-Ying Chen and Shuo Xiao interview their former mentor, Dr. Teresa Woodruff, at the SSR Annual Meeting. Dr. Woodruff, the recipient of the 2025 Carl G. Hartman Award, looks back on her career, sharing the personal story behind her biggest scientific milestones and her fierce dedication to advocacy. Hear her advice on taking "high risk" projects, what she learned from industry, why she loves teaching (from first grade to postdocs), and how a conversation by the beach led to the discovery of the zinc spark. This episode captures the profound impact of mentorship and the passion that drives a truly extraordinary career in reproductive science.

Transcript

Speaker 1 The following feature conceived podcast is sponsored by the Virtual Education Committee of the society for the Study of Reproduction, with a mission to develop virtual programs that will aid in the education of listeners, highlighting the careers of society members, and bring technology updates in the latest scientific advancements in reproductive biology. Thank you for listening. Hello everyone. My name is Yu-Ying Chen. I'm a postdoctoral fellow at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in the United States.

Speaker 2 Hello everyone. I'm Shuo Xiao, an associate professor from Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at Rutgers University.

Speaker 1 As members of the Virtual Education Committee of SSR, Shuo and I are honored to be here at the SSR Annual Meeting in person to interview Doctor Teresa Woodruff for receiving the twenty twenty five Carl G. Hartman Award. This award, named after the distinguished reproductive biologist Carl G. Hartman, is the society's highest honor, recognizing a career of impactful research and scholarly achievement in reproductive biology.

Speaker 2 Doctor Woodruff is currently the president emerita and Research Foundation Professor at Michigan State University, and in fact, she is also our mentor. I have the privilege of completing my postdoc training with her, and while Yu-Ying was a graduate student in her lab.

Speaker 1 It's like a mini lab reunion. It's truly special to have you here with us today. Teresa, would you like to say hello to the audience?

Speaker 3 Yes. Hello, everyone. I'm delighted to be here with you and the audience.

Speaker 1 Let's start from the very beginning. Can you tell us a little bit about where you grew up, your professional journey, and what led you to become a reproductive biologist?

Speaker 3 Sure. I grew up in the middle of Illinois, just south of Chicago, and my mother was a first grade teacher, and my grandmother was a teacher of all grades on the prairie, uh, western prairie of Oklahoma. So education was very critical to them. And I thought I was going to be a first grade teacher. So a fun fact is, I, you know, when I finally retire, I want to be a first grade teacher. Um, but, uh, I became really interested in science, uh, from a chemistry teacher in high school, and, uh, went to college originally to be a first grade teacher. And then I finished all the curricula very quickly. And so my dad said, well, pick another major. And when I did, I picked chemistry and biology. And, uh, at that point, I didn't know of this thing called research. I thought you could only go and be a physician. And in fact, I wasn't interested in being a physician. But then a chemistry professor asked me if I wanted to join him for a research experience in California at Caltech. And I said, sure. What is this research? And I soon came to understand that this was developing the answers that are in the back of the book. And I thought that was really cool. And so I applied to graduate school at Northwestern and got in there and did the rotations that we all do now. And, um, I found Kelly Mayo, who was in his very first year as a faculty member and started working with him in the reproductive biology area and never left.

Speaker 2 Well, that's great to hear. What you do before your scientific and research career. We all know that you made a very unconventional move early in your career by joining genentech to continue your graduate work on Activin and Inhibin, and later returned to academia at Northwestern. So what was your experience like working in the industry? I believe all trainees will be interested in that. And what motivated you to come back to the academic world after that?

Speaker 3 I think that's a great question. It was a real pivotal point for me. So when I finished my graduate work, the question was, well, what to do next? And I really wanted to continue the lineage, as you said, of work on Inhibin and activin. And at the time, Genentech was the place that was doing this work. They were cloning the receptors or working toward cloning the receptors. And then interestingly, applying that science towards human health. And that really attracted me. Well, I didn't want to be a physician. I wanted to actually help humans, um, and particularly in the reproductive sciences. So I did make that unconventional decision. I would say, Neena and Kelly, if you're listening, Kelly, I don't think that was the decision that you expected. But, uh, I did end up going to Genentech, and I was the second postdoc there. So they had just started their postdoc, uh, group. And, uh, Arthur Levinson, who became the CEO, I think was the first postdoc. So, um, that was, uh, a decision that in the end, um, was really profound. And the real differences between going to industry and being in the academy as an industry, you're really just working towards the goal of application. And you don't always look at all the kind of ancillary parts of that problem, maybe a mechanism or, uh, maybe a new molecule. So you have kind of a linear path and they're interesting things, but off target in academics, you can actually follow the science as well as your molecules. But in addition, you have the opportunity to really, um, identify new and create new areas of interest. And the way I, um, think of that in, in the Academy is that through the students who come in and are able to take on the initial problem, but then ultimately go on to build new whole areas, and both industry and academia, I think are fantastic, um, career opportunities. I'm a little biased towards academics, but, uh, it was unconventional, but in the end it really worked out.

Speaker 1 What would you say if you have like a very clear research goal, which is also like of an interest of the industry, then it's actually going to move like much more efficiently as compared to academia.

Speaker 3 It may, but it also depends on if that company wants to continue that work. So, for example, uh, Genentech decided to stop all its activin and inhibin work in nineteen ninety four. I went in nineteen eighty nine. And, uh, that decision was because they had put, um, activin into baboons at a continuous dose. And what we know about the TGF beta superfamily is that causes what we now know to be a massive apoptotic event in the liver. And so they called it the most hepatotoxic molecule ever tested. So, uh, it meant that that whole program then was shelved. So I think for anybody thinking about going to industry, you have to really want to be part of that lineage of problem solving towards patients not led to a problem for me. I've been able to keep whatever problem I wanted to work on as long as I wanted, and then when I wanted to move on, something different. Then we moved to something different.

Speaker 1 And what was the motivation of you coming back to Northwestern? Were you looking at academic jobs?

Speaker 3 I was, yeah. So when Genentech was bought out by Roche, um, And and when the decision was made to change, the active inhibitor portfolio really began. It became very clear to me that my interest wasn't just in getting drugs to patients, but really in solving problems and mechanisms and really going down what might be considered an industry or rabbit hole. Um, and, uh, I really also enjoy teaching. And so, uh, industry is really less about teaching, and teaching to me is from first grade to postdocs. Teaching is really what I love to do. So that decision was fairly easy. And then as I looked around for various opportunities, going back to where you trained is not always an option. But for me it was Neena was retiring. So it was a real opportunity and I was so happy to go back to Northwestern.

Speaker 1 Looking back, would you say that you've always felt successful throughout your career? Were there any particular challenging moments. If you would like to share with us.

Speaker 3 Well, you know, I think for all of us, we have challenging moments in our career. And certainly that transition between Genentech and going back to Northwestern was a it was an inflection point for me. And, um, the good news is I had confidence that I'd be able to succeed. And one of the things that I tried to instill in all my trainees, and certainly, hopefully both of you, is that confidence to keep going. And sometimes in the moment it seems impossible or improbable or, you know, the impediments are so high. But if you just keep taking that next step, oftentimes good things happen. And, uh, so circumstances around you can pressure people to make decisions that they might not when there was less pressure. So I always say cortisol levels really dampen your ability to think. You know, I think that Genentech transition was a was a real challenging moment for me. But, uh, you just keep moving ahead. We also had a very challenging time in the late Two thousands where both of you are not in the lab, then for either of you. But that was when the, uh, grants were really cut a great deal. And, uh, I had a big center grant on environmental health. Actually, um, you may not know that, but it was a big Superfund grant, and it got funded. And then because of the government crisis, it was not awarded. So.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I do remember.

Speaker 3 Do you remember.

Speaker 2 That you hired me?

Speaker 3 Yes. Which was really good. It was one of my favorite grants, actually. Uh, there was a Superfund site along the Illinois River, and we had come to really know and love that community. So anyway, that was a moment when I had to kind of pick up the pieces and Shuo. You'll remember that as a consequence of that, we started some of the work actually.

Speaker 1 So so when I was not awarded, were you looking at other like private funding opportunities.

Speaker 3 For that Superfund grant? No we weren't. The government was really the sole place for that kind of environmental toxicology. And I think that's that has been traditionally the case. As we think about it now, there's going to have to be more private funding that comes into the the research and development field, and hopefully we'll inspire some companies or individuals to do that. Um, but no, that just was a point of now we have to do something different, which we did.

Speaker 2 That's great to hear.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I still remember in the first day I checked in in your office when I started my postdoc career, you told me I should find my three pillars. And also I need to target three years and I should move to a factory. Yeah, I'm glad I made it. So I guess other trainees and junior faculty will want to hear more about your opinion regarding the career career development. So what do you see as the key priorities at different career stages, and what advice would you give to a student, postdoc and junior to mid career of faculties.

Speaker 3 Right. And you know what the way I think about I tried to always personalize and tailor training to each individual. I don't know if you felt that, but uh, in your case, I really saw a lot of me in you and, you know, I did everything very fast. I did a three year high school. I did a less than three year PhD. I did a postdoc in two years. And my feeling was by moving to the next level when you could, you always had the most fresh and invigorated time. And so I do remember telling you that, and I was right. Even though it was hard, there was a point when you had to leave that both of us were like, I don't think we want to do this, but, um, I think tailoring and being thoughtful about each individual and their career trajectory and their capacity, uh, is really critical. Yu-Ying, in your case, um, the tailoring for you was you. You are a towering intellect, and I had a problem that I wanted to solve from the very beginning. That was not going to be in three years. So I didn't tell you you were leaving in three years. And, uh, and actually, you know, when I said three years, we didn't know what those three years would be, right? And they turned out to be extraordinary. Thank you. They really turned out to be extraordinary in your case. Yu-Ying, we were trying to solve a problem nobody else had solved. And, you know, at some level, the edges of which are going to be your career. It takes a towering intellect to be able to take that question and be able to make deltas upward, deltas to keep moving towards that, that problem. Now, you also had the advantage of being in Covid, and I say advantage because I've never a negative thinker. That was also part of, uh, of your trajectory, I think for each person. And I guess the three pillars is something that I've taught to everyone. You have to have three ways of thinking about what you want to accomplish, and it does depend on career stage. What you're thinking about when you start is much more micro than as you develop, but eventually you'll develop three pillars that hopefully will stay very stable through the rest of your career. And I think for advising doctoral students in particular as a little bit less on postdocs, but certainly doctoral students. And I ask you how many doctoral students you've had? Three so far, doctoral students start out. And I gave the example of Yu-Ying when you started as a really fascinated about the problem, but very quickly it becomes very hard and then you start making discoveries. And I always say that you will know the answer before I do. And at some level it can be hard as the PI switches places with the student as you begin to know more because you're doing the work, and particularly for really extraordinary students, which we've had in my lab. I've had the great advantage of working with, really, the reproductive scientists that in our lab have always been just extraordinary. But you will know more than I do much more quickly. So as a P.I., you have to be very you have to know that you have to know that there will be places where you will know more than I do, and you have to be okay with that. So there has to be a humbleness while still running the lab. I think that question you ask of how you mentor at different career stages, that awareness becomes an important part of building the confidence of the individual and still building towards the the outcomes that the lab needs. The lab has to go on. I guess the other thing that I always did with, with each of you, hopefully, is, is to have you start developing your, your, um, pillars, but also telling both of you that anything in the lab you can take with you. It is all for you. And I think one of the reasons that the readiness to launch for every student was not as hard as maybe some other labs where you left the lab and you could take maybe what you were just doing or nothing at all, is that you could you had access to everything. You could take every problem, every grant, every reagent. And I think that's why we've had so many students that have continued to succeed and will be here at SSR. I hope those are some of the ingredients. And I would suggest as you both become leaders, which you are, that you do that too. The interesting thing is that when you let things go, you have to develop something new. I think that's a those are ingredients for success.

Speaker 1 Like a way to force you to, to motivate you to come up with new ideas. It does.

Speaker 3 It does.

Speaker 1 I still remember your last meeting. Like when before you left, and then you presented like five or six projects in a row. That's so epic.

Speaker 2 Right now. You're overwhelmed. I'm thinking about Teresa.

Speaker 3 I do remember Shuo’s last talk too. It was a tour de force, and it really did mark an era in the lab. So the lab has had different eras, and that was a particular era. The lab was enormous when you were there. It had been enormous before you for the for the early days of Oncofertility. And then you brought us beyond fertility. It was really it was a I remember that very well. I wish we had recorded it. Yeah. I wish we had a podcast of your last talk.

Speaker 1 So outside of your scientific work, you've been like a really passionate advocate for outreach, education policy and leadership and funding initiatives like Oncofertility that you mentioned, the Women's Health Science program and pushing for a sex exclusion policy. Could you share with us, um, how some of these efforts got initiated?

Speaker 3 Yeah. So, um, I was at Genentech and I was a postdoc. I think it was when I was still postdoc. It might have been when I was a first research scientist that they were doing a clinical study on tissue plasminogen activator, which is still used today, one of the first recombinant blockbuster drugs for stroke and heart attack. And they came back with a clinical trial. Clinical trial results. And it was on all men. So I raised my hand in a group of mostly men to say what happened to the women. And it was almost a naive question. But there are two things. One, that was, uh, really profound is the action of raising your hand, which I try to always inspire. Ask that next question. You know, they didn't really have an answer because all clinical trials were done that way. That led to years of advocacy. I think that continues to be important today. We have to continue to make the arguments. And there was a period of time when I when we were working in this domain and others that, you know, there would be folks in the political world that would say something just radically crazy about reproductive health. And at first I would kind of be a little mad about that. And then I said, well, we've just got to educate more. We've just got to educate more. I remember very vividly when Candace Tingen was in the lab, and we were working on some of the activation studies in the egg, and the Dickey-wicker amendment became a real sticking point for us. And as a consequence, the twelve hours most important to all of us as humans, one hundred percent of us cannot be studied in the reproductive sciences. So Candace came into the into lab meeting and she always sat to my left hand, which I always loved. And I said, Candace, we've got to change the law. Go write a nature paper, which she did. So and we're still working on that. So that's really critical. So education policy outreach to me, all of these are intertwining and really equally critical, particularly in the reproductive sciences, for all of us to to do and contribute to.

Speaker 2 So whenever I go to toxicology meeting, I always tell my colleagues, my postdoctoral mentor, Teresa made the inclusion of both male and female in all NIH funded research. Yeah, I'm very proud of that.

Speaker 3 Now, some people say it's like, oh, it's going to cost too much, but good science doesn't cost too much.

Speaker 2 Of course. So regarding your career and research, so we all realize your research spans a remarkable range from activin inhibin those peptide hormones biology and then to oncofertility and something related to toxicology. And also I'm honored to work with you on the engineering of the microfluidic system and bioengineered ovary. And they also studied zinc spark for everything you do. You make great achievements. And so where do you does this idea come from and how do you choose which direction to pursue and how do you handle those multiple projects on your plate?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think that's a great question. Sometimes it can feel, particularly if you are just starting your lab, that you have to do too many different things. I think the three pillar concept helps compartmentalize ideas. So all of these things actually flowed from from the lineage of my original pillars. But I will I will say that in each of those that you list where there where we ran into a problem, technology can solve it. So I was I think what we were always happy to do was to collaborate. Or I guess we were fearless to do it. We're always fearless to collaborate, and we're always fearless about bringing new technology into the lab. And part of that as well, is that some of the old stuff had already left the lab, so we had to come up with something new. But, you know, for example, the Fluidics, what an extraordinary opportunity. And that was there was a DARPA grant to try and build new technologies for the military in Afghanistan and Iraq, so that if there were biologics, that you could test each tissue rather than having to do it on on an individual. And so that became really interesting. But in that in that case there was no reproduction. They were going to look at all the organs of the body but not the reproductive one. So we had to make the case that it was invaluable for us to look at that. So, you know, those early days were really interesting. We had before EVATAR, we had a lot of names. I do name a lot of stuff. So, you know, nomenclature I guess, matters. But in that case, um, you know, what became EVATAR really came out of advocacy for what we were doing. And I still remember staying up in front of all the DARPA people talking about ovulation as the single most autocatalytic, self-destructive event in all of biology and saying, why are we talking about this? So in the end, it became an essential part of what became DARPA. And then ultimately the NUCATS grant. So ideas come from are inspired by the problem set by the need and then choosing those directions largely depends on the individuals in the lab and their capacity and their interests. And I always tried to tailor to individuals, but kind of, um, never as an absolute directive. The only difference being the zinc spark, which really came out of nowhere. And, uh, that stands as one of the singular, most interesting discoveries that Alison Kim made. But really, it was all because Tom and I had a conversation. It was because females weren't ever studied in the context of zinc biology. So, uh, be ready for the extraordinary when you're running your lab and, uh, give yourself twenty percent of your time to kind of do those things that are outside the pillars. So you've got your pillars, but there's a little bit of time there, a little latitude for inspiration.

Speaker 1 I remember the interview of you and Tom together. Oh, you talk about how you were like walking by the beach. And then Tom mentioned like zinc and sperm and you're like, no, what about zinc and eggs?

Speaker 3 Yeah. I think I said the three most unfortunate words in my life, I don't care.

Speaker 2 Yeah,Yu-Ying before you came. And she told me some zinc sparks in plants.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 2 See, that's like even beyond what I heard.

Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah, we're trying to we're trying to finalize that, which would be, um. Yes. With the pollen tube coming down and touching the egg. So we have that by imaging. And there is a calcium wave. So. Yeah. Um, Aaron Sue is working on.

Speaker 1 Oh, okay.

Speaker 3 We're really excited about that.

Speaker 1 That's exciting. I always remember, like, you talk about this plate where you can detect extracellular zinc that you can use to evaluate.

Speaker 3 So we're still working on that. That's been harder to do than just putting the zinc in the zinc probe in the media. So being able to capture on a plate is still something Tom and his group are trying to invent. We do now have the zinc spark in Icsi in And monkeys that we did with the Oregon Primate Research Center. So a lot of interesting things in that domain.

Speaker 1 Exciting. So next to my favorite question, what to your opinion is the most important open question in the field of reproductive biology? And where do you see the fields going?

Speaker 3 Well, I would say whatever the two of you are doing is the most important thing. I mean, I do think contraceptive, um, questions of contraception and managing reproduction is really critical. And that's really on the applied spectrum. And what you're doing really on the early follicle selection and activation still ranges in my head as, as really a critical unanswered question. I think those represent two domains that I'm still fascinated by and want to watch what you're both doing over time. And, uh, I think the zinc biology is also really cool. Not many people have gotten on that bandwagon, which is really interesting to me. It's like, wow, this is like one of those really crazy clever parts of, um, evolutionary biology, because when you started to do mitosis and then needed to do meiosis, you didn't have a lot of assets available. So things like zinc became a real asset as you were developing these two great replicating paradigms. So I'm really interested in kind of going back to the origins and thinking about that, and I'm excited about that as well.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Teresa always has great ideas about reproductive biology.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 2 So actually she brought me to the drug development.

Speaker 3 Field right.

Speaker 2 From the Contraception Foundation project. I never thought I would do some drug development even though I'm in school of pharmacy. Right. But I was told other people I'm more interested in drug development. So I start to talk to medicinal chemists and that person about the in vitro screening.

Speaker 3 Right. Thank you for this extraordinary work, their extraordinary work.

Speaker 2 Thank you. Yeah. Since this is the SSR award interview. Let's have some fun questions about SSR. Okay, so how long have you been an SSR member? And do you still remember some of your favorite memories from the SSR over the years?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I, I I've been an SSR member since, uh, since I was a postdoc. So nineteen ninety Kelly Mayo was, uh, hi. Kelly was an endocrinologist, so we always went to the Endocrine Society meetings. My very first meeting and first plane ride was to the Endocrine Society meeting in, uh, in New Orleans in nineteen eighty eight. My first SSR meeting, uh, was nineteen ninety. The thing that I remember. So I was a postdoc then and uh, it was just one of the most, as I think it still is, trainee focused meetings. I quickly got on committees, which I always encourage all my students to do get on committees, go do the work. I think, um, one of my earliest memories was being on the SSR membership committee, and at that time we had large animals and small animals. And so I got to meet a lot of people, a lot of from a lot of different walks of life. Uh, I just love SSR.

Speaker 1 It is such a beautiful, full circle moment when, um, your mentor, Doctor Neena Schwartz, also received the Carl G Hartman Award. And actually, during the time when you're actively working with her. So what does it mean to you that now you're getting this same award?

Speaker 3 It's just it really is a remarkable full circle, as you've you've said, and I've reflected on Neena and her legacy. You know, she was really quite a leader. And so I came in to fill her shoes as she retired. And, uh, so now to get the Hartman Award when I'm, I think I've still got another grant in me, but still kind of at the waning rather than the beginning. Uh, time, uh, really does, uh, strike a chord with me. And as I was thinking about it, I was thinking about, you know, she founded SSR with a number of of folks. And it's really critical for all of us in this field to continue to think and understand and know our origin stories. You know, we saw Janice Bahr's picture out in the hallway. For those of you who weren't at the meeting, there's a full page on her that's here. It's critical to know those who came before us. You know, sometimes we get very monofocal on what we're doing. We don't read outside our area of interest. I think, you know, Neena taught me to read widely and to think very broadly and then just go do it, get it done. And, uh, at the time we were doing the estrous-cycle and I had to be in, you know, twenty four hours a day, basically sleeping in her office, taking care of dispatching animals. So, you know, it does bring back a lot of great memories of of she as a mentor and Kelly as a mentor. And I never knew Doctor Hartman, obviously, but, uh, really a great, great honor. And I think of it not as an honor for me, but as an honor for the Woodruff lab.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it is always good or great to hear about Neena's story. So it's. I believe both Yu-Ying and I are very honored to be, uh, her grand.

Speaker 3 Grand.

Speaker 2 Grand.

Speaker 3 Grand trainees.

Speaker 2 Yeah. So, to wrap things up, so we have a few fun questions for you. So what do you enjoy doing in your free time?

Speaker 3 I love the garden. I have a huge garden. Uh, just this last week, I was harvesting five pounds of currants from my currant bushes. And I was making, uh, fruit pectin for my jelly making, uh, and I have apple trees that I make cider. And I just picked a whole bunch of French green beans, and I'm gonna have pumpkins soon, so I love to garden and then use that to cook and share with family and friends.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I did see a lot of good pictures from oncofertility, so enjoy your garden.

Speaker 1 If you weren’t a reproductive biologist, what do you think your alternative career.

Speaker 3 first grade teacher. That would be a first grade teacher. I my mom was a first grade teacher, and she always said that the most transformational time in a person's life is first grade, because you go from being able to count to being able to add, from not being able to tie your shoe, to being able to tie your shoe, to being able to tie your shoe, you know, to not being able to just being able to do ABCs, being able to read and then write, which is, uh, you know, the amazing next step. So first grade teacher.

Speaker 2 Great. So and finally, uh, what's next for you?

Speaker 3 Oh my goodness. Shuo, that is that's quite a question. Well, you know, I'm in the lab right now, so I wrote a grant. Um, and thank you to both of you for helping me with that. I think my real passion right now is in that zinc domain, trying to figure out the plants that I think will be particularly interesting.

Speaker 1 Okay. At the end, we have a couple this or that or rapid fire questions that we've prepared and you're answering like, uh, with your instinct.

Speaker 3 Okay.

Speaker 1 Beach or mountains?

Speaker 3 Uh. Beach.

Speaker 1 Books or concerts.

Speaker 3 Books.

Speaker 1 And your favorite book.

Speaker 3 Recently, I just finished reading the Annie Proulx nineteen ninety one book, The I'm Thinking of The Sheltering Sky, because that is my favorite book. But I just read a fantastic book. The, uh, the Shipping News shipping. I highly recommend it. It's a brilliant book.

Speaker 1 History or sci fi?

Speaker 3 History.

Speaker 1 Sweet or savory?

Speaker 3 Sweet

Speaker 1 Coffee or tea?

Speaker 3 Coffee.

Speaker 1 Grant writing or data analysis.

Speaker 3 Grant writing.

Speaker 1 Wet lab or dry lab.

Speaker 3 Wet lab.

Speaker 1 Hypothesis driven questions or discovery based research.

Speaker 3 Goodness, both are so fun. That's all I can say. Both. I have to say both. There's no this or that, I guess. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Play safe for guaranteed publication or high risk?

Speaker 3 High risk. Did we ever do anything safe? I don't high risk.

Speaker 1 Purple or green.

Speaker 3 Oh, now, that's not fair. No, it's not fair. Well, actually, the truth is the oncofertility logo is purple and green. So if you've seen it. And that logo. I invented it. The purple is the deep knowledge of self, and the green is the spring green of internal hopefulness. So the intertwining of green and purple. Okay, that's good answer.

Speaker 1 Where would you like to live if you get to pick a place outside of the US?

Speaker 3 Uh, that's a great question as well. Probably Paris.

Speaker 1 Paris. Okay. All those questions will conclude our interview today. Thank you so much for sharing your time and your insights with us today.

Speaker 3 Thank you both.

Speaker 2 And congratulations again on receiving the award. You have inspired so many of us, and both through your science and your leadership.

Speaker 3 Thank you both. I just love you both.

Speaker 1 So to our listeners, thank you for joining us on this special episode of Future Conceived. Be sure to follow the podcast and stay tuned for more conversations with leaders in reproductive biology. Thank you all.