Exclusive interview with Andrew Tsin, Ph.D.

May 28, 2009

Dr. Andrew Tsin is more than a faculty member in the College of Sciences. He is also the Director of the Center for Research and Training in the Sciences, and the Associate Dean for Research. In his 28 years at UTSA, Tsin has brought in millions of dollars in funding, and touched the lives of young researchers and students alike.

Tsin shares his story with Dean of the College of Sciences, Dr. George Perry in this one-on-one interview.

Perry:
Where are you from?

Tsin:
Originally I was born and raised in Hong Kong, which is a British colony, so I was born a British subject. Then I became a Canadian citizen, and now I’m a United States citizen. I went to Canada for my undergraduate and graduate education. I came to the Baylor College of Medicine in Texas for my postdoctoral fellowship.

Perry:
What brought you to UTSA?

Tsin:
A faculty position. This opportunity opened up and I took it.

Perry:
What influenced you to go into the field of biology?

Tsin:
I’ve always been a biologist. My undergraduate degree is in biology with a minor in chemistry. My graduate degree is comparative physiology and biochemistry. Biological systems are the most fascinating thing to me.

I’m interested in animals—zoology. My Ph.D. is in zoology, but they don’t even call it that anymore. They call it integrated biology or something. I just happen to specialize in trying to understand how the eye functions. There are not many eyes in plants so I have to work with animals.

Perry:
Please explain your research.

Tsin:
I have always been interested in understanding the basic mechanism related to visual perception. I try to understand how the eye works. My laboratory and I have an emphasis on basic biology. We’re trying to learn how the retina detects light and sends that signal to the brain. We’re interested in the primary photochemical events. That means how light actually interacts with the molecule called rhodopsin in the retina, and the recovery and regeneration of that molecule.

In addition, we focus on understanding the underlying method of diabetic retinopathy. It’s one of the major causes of blindness in the world. We’re looking at chemicals called cytokines that are secreted by one cell to try to inform another cell what to do. The one we’re interested in is Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF); we want to understand how an increase in sugar in the blood somehow relates to increases of VEGF destroying certain cells in the capillaries in the retina, resulting in diabetic retinopathy.

Perry:
What animals do you study?

Tsin:
The basic science we use is mostly mammalian cell models: bovines, humans, birds.

Perry:
So you’re doing cell models?

Tsin:
But in the diabetic retinopathy use mainly cells in culture. We culture ocular cells.

Perry:
Do these studies involve graduate students?

Tsin:
Oh definitely. The model I developed here is to integrate undergraduate and graduate students in research and training. Eighty to ninety percent of my publications have had student co-authors. Because of the support we receive at UTSA, most of the students come from the minority student research programs such as Minority Access to Research Careers Undergraduate Student Training in Academic Research (MARC U *STAR) and Minority Biomedical Research Support - Research Initiative Science Enhancement (MBRS-RISE).

Perry:
Tell me about your funding at UTSA and how it’s helped develop the university.

Tsin:
There are a number of research grants coming from federal agencies like the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and private foundations for research conducted in my laboratory. From 1981 until now, the total for that funding is $4 million, and includes at least two R01 grants. I also serve as primary investigator or program director for a number of grants that service the university and promote research for faculty and students. The total funding for those grants is $48 million.

Currently, I am completing the fifth year of a five-year commitment of $10 million for the Research Center for Minority Institutions (RCMI) grant. We’re trying to renew that grant for an additional $10 million over the next five years. Also, the Support of Competitive Research (SCORE) program, which supports 14 faculty members, has an NIH commitment of $14 million.

Perry:
Are you an active member of any scientific organizations?

Tsin:
I have been an active member of the Association Research Vision Ophthalmology Society; in fact, I’ve been so active, that I’ve recently been selected as an ARVO Fellow. Also, I’m finishing my third year of a three-year term on the board of directors of Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS), which promotes education and training of minorities in research. This has been consistent with the rest of my career.

I’m doing research and teaching in an institution with high number of students underrepresented in the sciences. My professional career has been dedicated to research and teaching of Hispanic students.

Perry:
Why is The Center for Research and Training in the Sciences (CRTS) so important to research in the college, and what have you done to make it a more effective agent of change?

Tsin:
It is partly my long-term experience working with these programs. The MBRS program has been here since 1981, and I took over in the early 1990s. These are multi-million dollar programs. The NIH has put in so many resources for these programs, so are these programs sharing offices, staff and resources?

When you have programs running separately, there are a lot of duplications, redundancies. It will save the federal government a lot of money and a lot of resources if these programs are running together. It gives us a base to go after more resources. We now have 15 staff, a professional full-time grant writer, a web specialist, an events manager, and one person completely dedicated to purchasing for all the programs. Two years ago we had six programs—now we’re up to 12.

Perry:
What advice do you give students wanting to enter the sciences?

Tsin:
I can share with them my personal excitement about science. That’s the way I train my students in the lab—science is fun, science is rewarding. A lot of people think that science doesn’t pay, that you don’t get a job, well that’s not true.

Scientists get good jobs, good pay, and it’s not just limited to the professors you’re looking at. They’re placed all over the community—in the oval office, in Center for Disease Control, in government facilities, in private companies, there are even scientists working in HEB, if you can believe it or not. When you look on TV, the only job anyone knows is medical doctor. Everyone knows that’s a good profession. Students don’t know that family practitioners make less than most faculty members here. Scientist is a really good career; we get to do what we like to do, and it’s very rewarding.

Perry:
What should be the major focus of research at COS?

Tsin:
Eye research! We’re supportive of neurobiology as well as cell and molecular biology because those are the existing strengths within the college, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t look for other areas of development.

What fascinates me is the new development in molecular biology because it will allow us to understand the molecular basis of disease. And that’s the total new generation of drug development and cures of new diseases.

When it comes to research, there’s really no one area. You define the problem and whatever tool, whatever approach is needed to go after the problem, you use it. That’s what we do in the lab. That’s why it’s exciting because we’re always learning, it’s wonderful. And the students are catching the “research fever” with us. That’s what we try to do, to expose them to the excitement of our research. That’s what we feel is some of our reward. A student in the labs is almost like a child because when he goes from undergraduate all the way to Ph.D. and goes to get a job, you feel that’s wonderful, that you’ve done something. And what is interesting is that it’s part of our career.

The bottom line is we’re committed to make this institution successful.