Pannie Trifillis is Vice President and Head of Global Scientific Affairs, Global Medical Affairs at PTC Therapeutics, a company that discovers, develops and commercializes therapies for rare genetic disorders. Ms. Trifillis has a PhD in Molecular Biology, Human Genetics from the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. in Biology and Chemistry from Wellesley College, where she was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar. I asked Ms. Trifillis to share with WayCoolWomen readers her thoughts and work because she has created an exciting path combining several fields in order to make a difference and help build a successful company. To learn more about her fascinating work, visit agapw.org/site/docpic/eventdp/2018.02.28TrifillisCV.pdf.
Misheel: What would you say to a young woman considering a career in science?
Ms. Trifillis: Do as much as possible in terms of finding the areas that interest you and combine different fields. From my experience, I started in biology, and then I combined the science aspect with business and found that I could do so much more. It made work more interesting by allowing me to view things at a higher level. Then I broadened my career and became involved in medical affairs, working cross-functionally across the company. I work with the research and clinical teams, the marketing and market access teams, colleagues in law and compliance, patient engagement and corporate communications, quality and regulatory affairs and right across the whole company, which makes for a much richer experience. And I love learning, so the more I continue to learn, the happier I am.
Misheel: You talked about colleagues in the legal department. How do you interact with them?
Ms. Trifillis: Part of the work that we do in medical affairs is engaging with key opinion leaders, the people who are experts in their field. So as part of that, you need to have a contract with them, so you need to make sure that you can talk openly and exchange ideas by establishing the legal terms for working together. Also, from the legal side, a major aspect of a company’s work is to safeguard its assets through patents. Part of my responsibilities is to set the strategy for our publications. During the process of publishing our research and clinical data, I work closely with our patent lawyers to ensure that we have patent protection before we disclose any of our data. In tandem with the legal team, I also work closely with the compliance team. Whenever we share information externally, whether it's our data or other information, we want to make sure that we are within the boundaries of what the company is allowed to talk about in terms of compliance rules. For example, if we have received approval to market a product in Europe but not in the US, then we are only allowed to talk about that product and its potential benefits in the EU countries where we have approval to market it, but not in the US. If the company doesn't have the authorization to market/sell, then it isn’t allowed to talk about the drug. So, there are considerations from both a legal and a compliance perspective.
Misheel: You mentioned that one of your teachers in high school peaked your interest in biology and genetics. Can you tell our readers about that experience?
Ms. Trifillis: I went to high school in Cyprus, and there, once you’re around 14-years-old, you need to make a decision about your future. You have to decide if you want to study science, or economics, or humanities, or follow a technical career instead of pursuing higher education. I had a teacher in high school who taught me both biology and chemistry. He loved his work and was so excited about teaching these two subjects. He conveyed this enthusiasm to his students, so that’s when I decided that I definitely wanted to study biology. I wanted to study microbiology for my bachelor’s degree, but Wellesley College didn’t have that specific major at the time, so I decided instead to study biochemistry, but they didn’t have that major either, so I then opted to do a double major in biology and chemistry.
Misheel: What was your biggest challenge getting into science as a young adult?
Ms. Trifillis: I always knew that I wanted to go to college, but I never thought beyond college. I certainly didn't think about doing graduate work or getting a PhD It wasn't until my advisor in college asked if I had considered doing graduate studies. In my case back then, and for people that don’t have a background or family who went to college, the concept of graduate school can be very foreign. In my family, I was the first one to graduate from a four-year college. So it was a revelation for me when my advisor suggested I should consider graduate school. That was the exposure and push that I needed to continue my pursuit of the sciences. My plan was to go to Penn get my PhD and then go back to Cyprus to work there. But life often changes your plans. At Penn I met my now-husband, so I ended up getting married and starting my career in the US. I can’t say that I faced a lot of challenges. Once I had the exposure, it was easy to follow the path. The challenge really is being disciplined and dedicated to devoting huge amounts of time and effort to do the actual work. Getting a PhD is not easy. Knowing that hard work is required for you to succeed was really instilled in me by my parents and also by my experiences while I pursued my PhD. Hard work and commitment were part of my upbringing. My dad worked for the Bank of Cyprus. It was, I think, his second or third job out of high school, and he spent his entire career working there, for about 40 years. He worked long hours, and he was very committed to his work. I saw that as a child, so he was an example for me to do the same.
Misheel: Bouncing off that, who were some of the most influential women in your life?
Ms. Trifillis: It's interesting that you ask this question. I have to admit that there haven't been a lot of women mentors in my life. Most of the influential people in my life have been men but there were a few women too. One woman who was influential in my career was a colleague and friend at PTC. She was on the marketing team and I was just starting my career in medical affairs. This colleague was somebody who believed in me from the start. She saw value in the medical advice that I was giving her, and that made me feel confident in entering this new field of work. It gave me the boost to keep going. So she was very influential in jump starting my medical affairs career. Another woman who, more recently, has had an impact in my nonprofit career is the president and founder of the Association of Greek American Professional Women (AGAPW), Dr. Olga Alexakos. She is a tremendous force within the organization; she not only founded AGAPW but she has single-handedly built and led the organization for nine years now. As a current member of the board of directors of AGAPW, I'm very much inspired by her and what she has done to continue the mission of AGAPW. Olga has been a great mentor and has facilitated my interactions with the Greek-American community.
Professor Cristina Pattuelli works in the School of Information at Pratt Institute in Manhattan. Originally from Italy, Professor Pattuelli earned advanced degrees in Philosophy, and Cultural Heritage Studies from the University of Bologna, and a Ph.D. in Information and Library Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I asked Professor Pattuelli to share her work with WayCoolWomen readers because she's always looking for ways to learn and grown, and connect people, ideas and resources. To learn more about her fascinating work, visit www.cristinapattuelli.org and www.pratt.edu/faculty_and_staff/bio/?id=mpattuel.
Misheel: What journey did you take to get where you are now? Did you always want to be a professor?
Professor Pattuelli: I never anticipated becoming a professor, actually. I come from a family of teachers, but didn’t see that for me in my early life. My journey has also been tied to my physical location. I became a librarian in Italy because of my interest in learning, culture, and sharing. It gave me the possibility of working with my local community and to make an impact while learning and growing on my own too. My desire to grow led me to India. I was interested in the culture and wanted to connect with people. I felt really good there. Then I had the opportunity to come to the US to study and grow, and I became a professor. I didn’t plan my life, and I'm still not planning my life. I'm more interested in taking opportunities that I come across. These opportunities have shaped me into who I am.
Misheel: What is your day-to-day work like? Can you describe a typical day, or if there are no typical days, what is one day at work like?
Professor Pattuelli: My days are not repetitive. I'd get very bored. I wake up very early when my brain is more active with ideas. I spend the first part of the morning making connections on the work that I'm involved with and things that I want to do socially or culturally. It's also the best time for me to work if I'm writing a paper. I prepare for class, and correspond with students and people I'm collaborating with. I spend the rest of my day at school meeting with students and teaching, sometimes six or more hours. It can be tiring, but working with students also energizes me. At this stage of my career, it's very important for me to mentor others, to share what I've learned. I also visit museums and art galleries close to work…the Whitney, the Rubin Museum and galleries in Chelsea.
Misheel: You talked about creativity do you ever translate that into your own work?
Professor Pattuelli: I'm not an artist, but I think creativity is a major drive for me. I have close relationships with people in the art world, so the projects I work on often look at art that goes in new directions. I also coordinate the Pratt SI Museums and Digital Culture MS Program. I think creativity means connecting people, ideas, resources...and linking the invisible, the not so obvious.
Misheel: I read that you are the founder of Linked Jazz. Why did you decide to create this?
Professor Pattuelli: As I mentioned, I enjoy linking things. By connecting the arts, you find new meanings, and you give context by situating them in new environments. I've been working for a while on a certain type of technology called The Semantic Web and Linked Open Data (LOD). As I was working with this technology, I decided a good environment was jazz, because I like jazz. Specifically, I was interested in the interaction among the jazz community, which is extremely intertwined. People who play together are also friends, so there is a good network of mentorship and influence. That's why I decided to apply this technology to jazz. The project is ongoing, and there are always different facets. Recently we've been looking at the proportion of women in jazz. Using Linked Open Data, we're able to study different communities in jazz that may not have a large online presence in order to connect them with the larger community.
Misheel: How are you making information on cultural heritage more available? What goes into making this more accessible?
Professor Pattuelli: Cultural heritage is not only monuments, it's things like archival materials. Using The Semantic Web and Linked Open Data makes this information more accessible so researchers can find it more easily and make use of it in new ways. I have two projects in the pipeline, one is on the art historian Bernard Berenson. I'm collaborating with an archivist at the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies which is located on the outskirts of Florence in Berenson's former residence, Villa I Tatti. We're extracting information from an archive of 33 diaries written by Mary Smith Costelloe, Berenson's wife, in order to visualize the cultural environment that surrounded Mary, what she was experiencing in her travels, in her day to day life, the kind of people she was connecting with, etc. The other project that I'm just starting is about Robert Rauschenberg. I'm working on connecting his personal archives, his own artwork and the art he collected with different pieces of information from different sources.
Misheel: What kind of advice can you give to young students about applying knowledge they learn in classes?
Professor Pattuelli: Students I teach want to become information professionals such as librarians and archivists. There is enormous value in knowledge. Knowledge has a way of finding its way help people, to enrich people, to guide them. Knowledge, even without a direct purpose at first, can find a situation in which it can be applied later. I also try to share with students the importance of having a critical view of systems, to understand limitations, to have some skepticism so they can make changes. Where I work, we have connections with the professional world outside the classroom...internships, fellowships. I teach a class called practicum seminar which is based on the experience they have working outside the classroom. They always have real-world scenarios to apply knowledge. My role is to help them to look at what they're doing outside the classroom with a critical eye toward the organizational culture, systems they use, system biases, how to improve systems, and just be self-reflective. I try to encourage them to cultivate their curiosity to drive them toward their interests, especially since a lot of students already come with a strong sociopolitical perspective.
