April 4, 2025 • 54 mins
Today, our host Peter O'Toole sits down with the distinguished Mario Roederer, ImmunoTechnology Section Chief and Acting Head of the Translational Research Program at the National Institutes of Health.
Mario shares some fascinating insights from his illustrious career, from demonstrating flow cytometry to Presidents Barack Obama and George Bush to developing the widely used FlowJo™ software.
He also shares his inspirations, starting from his family roots and early education to the pivotal mentorship of figures like Bob Murphy and Len Herzenberg. Plus, we learn about the challenges and triumphs of his career, including his critical work on medical countermeasures for infectious diseases.
Watch or listen to all episodes of Flow Stars: flowstars.bitesizebio.com
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Episode Transcript
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Intro (00:00):
Welcome to Flow Stars. Candid conversations between
doctor Peter O'Toole and the bighitters of flow cytometry.
Brought to you by BeckmanCoulter at Bite Size Bio.
Peter O'Toole (00:10):
Hello. And welcome to this packed episode
of Flow Stars with the one andonly one of the biggest names in
flow cytometry, Mario Rodera. Hetalks us through the highs and
lows of his long career,including how poorly he was
thought of in grad school,demonstrating cytometry to past
presidents Bush and Obama, andthe importance of developing
(00:33):
pipelines to prevent copy pasteerrors. All this and more coming
up in this episode. Hi. I'mPeter O'Toole, and welcome to
this episode of Flowstar. Today,I'm joined by Mario Rodera from
NIH still. Yes.
Mario Rodera (00:51):
Yep.
Peter O'Toole (00:52):
I do you know what? It's a real honor to meet
with you. I reflected back towhen I started my flow cytometry
career, and there were for me,personally, there were three big
names in flow cytometry. Therewas Howard Shapiro, Paul
Robinson, and yourself. And I'vebeen so fortunate to meet all of
(01:13):
you, and to actually get you torecord today is a real honor. So
thank you for agreeing to today,Mario.
Mario Rodera (01:18):
Oh, it's my pleasure.
Peter O'Toole (01:21):
So just to give you an idea of how important
Mario is, if you haven't metMario, I've been looking you
have you've actually met BarackObama, haven't you?
Mario Rodera (01:31):
Yes. And George Bush.
Peter O'Toole (01:33):
And George Bush?
Mario Rodera (01:35):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (01:35):
This is huge.
Mario Rodera (01:37):
I got to show them how pulsatile works. In fact,
with Brock, we had the LSR twoopen up so he could look in and
see the lasers and the pads. AndI had this nice display where we
had six different tubes ofquantum dots lined up. So if you
hold it to the laser, it lookslike the laser changes color as
(01:58):
it goes through because theyemit different different. Oh,
Peter O'Toole (02:02):
that's super smart. Just because, yeah, keep
them engaged. And even if it'snot true science per se, it
shows and gets them excited, Iguess.
Mario Rodera (02:11):
Yes. And, actually, asked some very
pertinent questions. He waspretty impressive. I was
impressed by him quite a bit.
Peter O'Toole (02:17):
How long did you get with him?
Mario Rodera (02:20):
About five minutes.
Peter O'Toole (02:22):
Still, I'll take my five minutes of fame at that
point.
Mario Rodera (02:26):
And then I got to ride in the motorcade over to a
different part of the other agewhere he had where he made a
major speech, and that that waskind of fun too.
Peter O'Toole (02:35):
That that's gotta be one of your highlights in
your career, hasn't it?
Mario Rodera (02:40):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (02:43):
That that's pretty special. And it also
shows you not just yourimportance, but the importance
of flow cytometry, which isobviously what you're famous for
worldwide, is the placecytometry side of things. What
got you into flow cytometry tostart with?
Mario Rodera (02:58):
Well, I have to blame Bob Murphy, my PhD adviser
at Carnegie Mell. I went toCarnegie Mell as a for my PhD,
and I turned his lab. And heused to look at endocytosis. And
so I started working with him onthat aspect. And I remember for
my PhD thesis proposal defense,which you give after one year, I
(03:23):
actually proposed to do a sevencolor experiment, which was
absolutely unheard of. And bythe end of my PhD career, I was
doing two or three colors, so Iwas a little bit ambitious, but
it set me on the path.
Peter O'Toole (03:37):
I so just just just for ease, this has got to
be the late eighties?
Mario Rodera (03:43):
No. Nineteen eighty four.
Peter O'Toole (03:45):
Nineteen '80 '4 and wanted to do seven color
flow cytometry.
Mario Rodera (03:49):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (03:50):
And I think we had to wait, oh, to the start of
the naughties?
Mario Rodera (03:57):
No. We were doing nine colour in nine five in 1998
or so.
Peter O'Toole (04:04):
That's I wasn't far off. I wasn't far off. And I
guess that that's, you know,that's how I know your
reputation is color. The numberof colors that you can actually
apply and do it sensibly. Yep.
How many, world records for thenumber of colors on a flow
cytometer? How many times haveyou broken that personally in
(04:25):
your lab?
Mario Rodera (04:26):
Oh, probably about 18 or so. But the one I'm most
proud of is we had a student inthe lab who is 22 years old and
planned and implemented a 23color experiment. That was the
first time anyone had ever donemore colors than their age.
Peter O'Toole (04:45):
That that's super cool, isn't it? And I guess
that's gonna be more and morecommon now as the number of
colors you can do by facecytometry has increased. I we
will come back to multicolors ina bit. But you got into phase
cytometry through your PhD andwhat you want to do. But if I
(05:06):
take you back to when you were10, 11, 12 years of age, can you
remember what the first job wasthat you ever wanted to do?
Mario Rodera (05:16):
I always knew I'd be a scientist. My father is a
physicist. He's now 95 and stillstill writing physics articles.
My brother who is 10 years oldwent into neurobiology
initially. And so I suspected Iwould always be a scientist at
(05:38):
one level or another.
Peter O'Toole (05:39):
Oh, wow. I've I've got to ask. What line of
physics was your dad or is yourdad still in?
Mario Rodera (05:45):
Space physics.
Peter O'Toole (05:47):
Space physics?
Mario Rodera (05:48):
And and yeah. Near Earth physics.
Peter O'Toole (05:52):
So you never want to be an astronaut?
Mario Rodera (05:55):
Of course. In fact, you know, the there's a
group down in, where are they?That's a guard that does
flow cytometry for space physicsfor for the astronauts. And I
always often thought I would goand, you know, work their site
I'd be their flow drafting ifthey needed someone to say this.
Peter O'Toole (06:18):
Well, come on. With with the way things get
going in space travel, it's notbeyond it yet, is it?
Mario Rodera (06:24):
Not yet. No.
Peter O'Toole (06:26):
Can I can always hope? So, okay, so so your dad
was a physicist. Your brotherwho's eight years older went
into neurobiology, but what wasyour what was your first degree
in?
Mario Rodera (06:39):
Chemistry. My father convinced me that I
should get a degree in a hardscience, not in a soft science.
And so I decided to go withchemistry because I was
basically a pyromaniac. And Ithought chemistry would be a
good way to learn how to makeexplosives and things like that.
But then I kind of lost interestin chemistry when I saw my I
(07:02):
took my first genetics course inas a freshman in college, and I
fell in love with biology andgenetics. And I always thought
to be a gene jockey when I wentto graduate school.
Peter O'Toole (07:15):
So so what changed? Just just through your
PhD that changed?
Mario Rodera (07:18):
Yeah. I think during and seeing the being able
to do technology development,I've always been somewhat good
at technology, and the genejockies didn't need any
technology development. Theyjust needed creative people who
could do biology, and that's notme. So working in, I got exposed
to developing technologies, boththe hardware and the software
(07:42):
based. I also wrote acquisitionpackages back then in the early
eighties that that BB gave awaywith their instruments. And so
that kinda got me hooked. Andthen from the biology side of
it, both I thought it washeavily used in immunology. So
just through the technology, Igot exposed to immunology, which
(08:02):
I love. That is my that's mylove. And so I went to Len's Lab
as a postdoc to immunology andcytometry, Len Herzenberg, and
the rest is basically history.
Peter O'Toole (08:15):
What was Len like to work for?
Mario Rodera (08:17):
Len was fantastic. I admire him so much. He he
always had the philosophy thatthe science belong to the people
because the people paid for it.So he had the initial group of
the initial patent holders onthe flow cytometer. He asked
that they sign over their rightsand money to the lab, and so he
was able to fund the lab quitewell and and always felt that
(08:41):
the science was owned by themasses of people who paid for
it.
Peter O'Toole (08:47):
And what was if I take you back to the start, what
was the first flow cytometer youused?
Mario Rodera (08:55):
That in Bob Lab, it was a 4 FACS440. That was the
first order, and we had we had athree color analyzer. No. That
was not we didn't use that. Butthen the four forty, fax four
forty, which is a fax four basedmachine. And then when I went to
(09:17):
Len's, we actually had a faxtwo, which became our first
eleven color machine as we sawdifferent detectors and and
other products to it. But thatwas a fax two that's now in the
Smithsonian.
Peter O'Toole (09:30):
Oh, wow. Have have you been have you actually
seen it in the Smithsonian?
Mario Rodera (09:35):
No.
Peter O'Toole (09:36):
No? Are you tempted to go and see it?
Mario Rodera (09:39):
Yeah. I think it's not you have to wait until it's
on display. Every so often,they'll bring it out on some
sort of special display. Soright now, it's just in a
warehouse. It looks like Raidersof the Lost Ark, that last
scene.
Peter O'Toole (09:53):
Well, that would be cool, though, wouldn't it?
Yeah. We should look at ananniversary date and try and
persuade them to celebrate theanniversary and bring it out on
display.
Mario Rodera (10:03):
I should have thought about four or five years
ago because I'm pretty surethose those are concocted five
years in advance.
Peter O'Toole (10:11):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (10:12):
But, yeah, that would've been fun.
Peter O'Toole (10:16):
And so that was your first cytometer. Do you
have a favorite cytometer thatyou've ever used?
Mario Rodera (10:22):
I think the LSR two was my favorite just because
it was so easy to use, and itwas very it was the first
cytometer we had where we hadreally good resolution of
different colors and so on. Andit was also digital. So I think
the the different aspects of itmade it my favorite. Plus, you
know, I'm basically responsiblefor the LSR two in b b because I
(10:46):
went to them and told them theyhad to build this for me. And
they did a market analysis andsaid they would do it if they
could because they thought theywould sell 50 of them in the
next few years, and they end upselling 2,000.
Peter O'Toole (11:01):
Yeah. The market's exploded, though,
didn't it, for Flow? It has. Andit's just growing, isn't it?
Mario Rodera (11:06):
Yep.
Peter O'Toole (11:07):
Just just incredible. So I've gotta ask
you. Have you ever had a MoFlow?
Mario Rodera (11:13):
Yeah. Well, we had a our original
cytometer in Len's lab, whichwas a FACS two, had the multiple
electronics because theelectronics is the we could do
high speed sorting, and we coulddo digital acquisition and so
on.
Peter O'Toole (11:29):
Okay. I've gotta say that that for me.
Mario Rodera (11:31):
So it's a it's a MoFlow attached on top of a fax
two bench.
Peter O'Toole (11:40):
Just a different era. I miss the MoFlo.
Mario Rodera (11:44):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (11:44):
I do miss it. So you mentioned earlier about the
software side, and you wereactually playing with the
software for the analysisbecause, obviously, the analysis
old school was very literallyanalog, very analog. So it's not
everyone who is into actuallycomputer programming and helping
(12:06):
with the analysis and thesetting of the software side of
it. Why why get into that sideof it? You know, you could just
be a user asking for morecolors. Why did you feel
compelled to help and addressthat side, the analysis side? I
didn't feel compelled. For me,it's just easy. Wiring software
for me is easy, and I have to bevery careful because it's
(12:26):
distracting enough that if Ihave a hard problem in biology
and I don't wanna deal to us,they're writing code. And coding
is very it's addictive for mebecause it's it's easy, and you
can see right away the thebenefit that you're having. But,
initially, I was doing itprimarily because we needed to
be able as we moved on beyondthree and four hours, we needed
(12:48):
software that could docompensation, which did not
really exist at that time. And
Mario Rodera (12:54):
we needed to do it in an automated and high speed
way, so that's why we initiallystarted running FlowJo, and then
ZAP was to have the ability tohandle the datasets we were
generating, which were beyondany software that existed at
that point.
Peter O'Toole (13:09):
And I I so now you've brought on to the the
FlowJo because you were you arethe founder or founder of
FlowJo. And for those No.
Mario Rodera (13:17):
No. No. No. Adam Preester we hired Adam Preester
into Stanford because he was a areal coder, and he and I
generated the first version thatwas commercialized.
Peter O'Toole (13:29):
And for those listening, if you don't know
what FlowJo is, FlowJo is one ofthe leading analytical software
programs. You'll find this inhospitals. You'll find this in
almost every university that'sout there. It is absolutely
fundamental and fundamentallyimportant. And the software
itself, I don't know if you'veever reflected on this. The
amount of fundamental researchthat FlowJo has enabled, it is
(13:55):
uncountable. It's huge. Yeah.And that's because of yourself.
Mario Rodera (13:59):
Well, someone would have to do it, but, yeah,
I happen to be fortunate enoughto be in a position where I
could do it and did do it. But Ido think I do remember going to
talks in the mid nineties andlater on in the two thousands
and so on where I'd see talks onpeople giving talks, and they
show a plot that I knew wasFlowJo because they're it's like
your child. If you have twins,as a parent, you can tell them
(14:21):
apart, but other people may notbe able to. So I could always
tell a plot that comes fromFlowDrop versus a plot that
comes from somewhere else. And Iwould see it more and more used
and presented, and I thought,well, this is something that I
think is gonna be big.
Peter O'Toole (14:38):
Is yeah. Alright. And and he's still huge.
Mario Rodera (14:41):
I think Still. Right.
Peter O'Toole (14:41):
Still the leading program, I believe, in market.
I've gotta be careful. As partof this series, I'm doing Dave
Novo as well. Obviously, whodoes the the the leading rival
software arguably? But it's notabout the software, is it? It's
about the history of it and justthe success. And what was it
(15:02):
like? So you started a companyfor FlowJo. How big a step was
that? Because that's, again, avery different step from just
being in academia doingresearch. Now having a spin out
Mario Rodera (15:14):
So that was primarily Adam, the cofounder of
FlowJo. He he had a company thathe used to sell very niche
software from, and so that wasTreeStar Incorporated or
TreeStar LLC. So we we licensedthe the software technology from
Stanford who owned it at thetime and then developed it more
(15:35):
and commercialized it andstarted selling it through the
portal, basically. So Adamreally took care of the business
and of the of the software for alot for twenty years.
Peter O'Toole (15:47):
Did it take a lot of your time, though? Because
there's there's one thing havingsoftware that works in your
hands for your lab. There'sanother thing once it becomes a
commercial product that the theuser interface has to be
glossier, more user friendly.Were you involved in a lot of
that, or was that part of thenpart of Adam's side and his
team?
Mario Rodera (16:05):
I was involved somewhat. In general, I'm not a
user interface kind of guy asyou correctly pointed out
because that requires a lot ofpatience and a lot of,
knowledge. So I did more of thethe algorithms and the basic you
know, I needed something so Iwould code it and and and
implement it back in Stanford. Idid a lot of that. So, yeah, it
(16:27):
consumed a lot of time, but italso saves a lot of time as a
consequence. So although itwould take me an hour or two to
write a new algorithm or or anew interface or so, it would
save me that time in spades downthe road as I did that as I use
it over and over in the lab aswell.
Peter O'Toole (16:45):
I it's fascinating listening to you,
actually. I have a data scienceteam, at York, and they're
always telling me that it's it'svital for them to develop the
pipelines to do the analysis.It's quicker to do that than to
to do grunt grunt through thedata analysis itself. Yeah. And,
you know, what you're sayingperfectly chimes with what
(17:07):
they're telling me all the timethat, no. No. No. Better to do
the pipeline, get the coding,and let it do it for you because
then it can just
Mario Rodera (17:14):
I continued at an age where I have my own lab. I
would write pipelines in indifferent softwares like the JMP
based software, JSL, which isjump a program that's put up by
SAS. I would write pipelines inthere to assist with people, but
to do their analysis or toautomate their analysis. I've
(17:34):
always felt that you don't wannado you need to have automated
analysis so you can always startfrom the raw data at the
beginning no matter how as youadd more and more data to it.
You always reanalyze the pipeuse the pipeline from the
beginning so that you don't makecopy paste errors. One of the
biggest problems in this inscience right now is too much of
it is done with copy paste. Andso you get halfway down an
(18:00):
analysis scheme, and you realizeyou did something wrong, and
then you have to go back and doit again. So that that's been my
main effort in not main, butthat's probably one of my big
efforts in the in the lab I runis to help them with the
pipelines because I know how towrite those.
Peter O'Toole (18:17):
So I you know, I've not thought about this
until just how do you so thecytometers themselves are now so
user friendly that you don'thave to be very expert at all to
be able to operate the analyzersalso. They they are super use
they've made them super good forimmunologists, other biologists,
(18:38):
life scientists to use. Thelikes of Flowjo make it really
easy to analyze the data. Do youthink there's ever a concern
that people are so disengagedwith what they're doing and they
just get putting tubes on themachine and spitting out data
analysis at the end that theymay misinterpret or design their
(18:58):
experiments badly? Do you thinkwe're getting more of that
because they're less techy andless thinking about what's
really going on.
Mario Rodera (19:06):
I think it's a real problem. I think it's
always been a problem, andthere's no easy solution. I
mean, to me, the solution is notto make sure the users know how
to do the how to do all thosethings or how the instrument
works. The solution is to embedthe people who are in the in the
lab so that they can participatein the design and implementation
(19:29):
of the experiments. But it meansyou always have to have people
who who sit on the fence oftechnology and biology. You need
to have people who understandboth sides and can translate.
They don't necessarily have tobe experts at either one, but
they have to be able totranslate. And that's something
I've always been proud to beable to do is to sit on that
fence and and talk to thebiologist and say, what do you
(19:51):
need and translate that to the.So a lot of the time people will
say, oh, I need to be able to dothis. I usually will call to me
and say, I need to do this.Well, no. Not quite true. You
don't need to do this, but youneed to do that, which is very
similar. And then if youimplement that, then it helps
them do whatever they wanted todo. And the reason is because
(20:12):
users don't necessarily know howto color what the appropriate
pipeline impact is. And then ifyou have people that that will
happen to able to decide whereyou have software engineers
who'll say, oh, the users whowant to do this, And I'll sit
there and go, no. That's notreally what they want to do.
They wanna do that, and youshould cut cut it this way. So
(20:35):
it's you need to have people whoare sitting on that fence who
know both the technology and thebiology who get embedded in the
in the biologists in in terms ofexperiment setup and
implementation and so on. Andthat's why that's why Johnny
Moore and I wrote our articleabout shared resource
laboratories back in 02/2003 or'4 or so when we put forward
(20:59):
that whole that whole conceptthat it's not, just a core
laboratory or it's a sharedresource laboratory. And the
idea of calling it sharedresource was to convey the fact
that you want to share the thedesign and share the knowledge
of the technology with thebiologist so that you get the
best of both worlds.
Peter O'Toole (21:21):
In shared resource, Cyto I'm very lucky.
We got a shared resourcefacility, and I've got an
excellent team that sits on thatfence and interface between the
two and a very integrated Iwould say the users are more
dependent on the technical staffthan they are on the
instruments. You know, the waythe system works now is they are
(21:42):
almost dependent on them to justhelp design their experiments.
There's a lot of teaching, lotsof training. We have lots of
external courses to help train,but when it comes to the
complicated stuff, they stillheavily lean on the team that we
have. And that is the perfectshape.
Mario Rodera (21:56):
It's great you can provide that. But my fear is
that business has become sosimple and and inexpensive that
people can buy them for theirown laboratory and never get the
the training or or assistancethat they really need.
Peter O'Toole (22:12):
Do you think, this is an if you think about
it, this is a blessing offinancially challenging times in
that it makes it harder eventhough the instruments are
getting cheaper. So I'm sorryfor all the manufacturers out
there making cheaper ones. Thethe running costs are not
insignificant. The servicecontract costs of these
(22:32):
instruments, it becomes a burdento individual labs. And that
actually so because of thatburden, it's encouraging more
and more not to put them intheir own labs, but to put them
in a shared resource. And thereare no other flow cytometers at
York but in the facility, andthere's five analyzers, I think,
three sorters, all just in andand no one would want I don't
(22:56):
think any of the users wouldwant their own because they've
got five at their disposal. Soif one was to break, there's
another four. They can havemultiple people on them at the
same time. It's very much acultural persuasion to explain
the benefits of those sharedresources and are more than just
the cost.
Mario Rodera (23:16):
I think too many people view or used to view
photosynthetic as a center ofeach. You come with your
samples, you put them in, youpress a few buttons, and you
come out with your cells at thebottom and the and the fluid at
the top. And that's you know,for for flow, it's a far more
complex technology that requiresa lot more thinking and and
(23:37):
processing and understanding theimpact of every step on your on
your experiment and and so on,optimizing the the panels and
and using reagents. I mean, it'samazing how people still don't
know what reagent titration isabout and and what the antibody
binding can what mechanism cantell us about binding. And so
(23:59):
those are all important facetsof a flow cytometer experiment,
and yet they're still not widelyunderstood.
Peter O'Toole (24:07):
I've always thought remember the first,
without naming any names oranything else, but the first
user friendly cell sorters. Andthey got quite a bad reputation
early on. And actually,personally, I think it was less
the cytometer's performance,more the fact that users were
now trying to sort withoutunderstanding how to even gate
(24:28):
strategically for cell sorting.
Mario Rodera (24:30):
Well, that's you know, I told the manufacturers
this when they came out with theinstruments. They said this
instrument won't need a core todo it. You could do it in your
own. I said that's a mistakebecause then if you make it if
you that's how you advertise it,then people will just generate
garbage data and won't andthey'll complain about your
instrument, and then peopleyou'll get a bad reputation. I
(24:51):
said, you don't do it that way.You gotta put it put it in
cores. But, you know, peoplewill have the money. They're
willing to buy it for their ownlab, and then they complain
about why it didn't work.
Peter O'Toole (25:03):
And it it is and and it really was the case, I
think.
Mario Rodera (25:06):
Yeah. I mean, I remember in the in the February
when we were doing 18 colorexperiments and so on, postdocs
would come to my lab becausethey wanted to do these
experiments, and they said, Iwanna do I wanna do an 18 color
experiment. And this is, youknow, this is the panel I want
to use. And I just let them go,and they come back to me and
say, this didn't work at all.This is complete crap. And I
(25:29):
said, no. The the problem isthat you have you have to build
it up step by step. And then wego back and build it up step by
step, and it'll work. It takessix months, but it would work
eventually. And the problem wasthat they simply you know, they
and I what I thought about wasthis is what goes on in eighty
percent of the lives worldwidewhere people try an AT and and
it doesn't work, and they saythis is crap. It'll never work.
Peter O'Toole (25:53):
I I'm going to, I try not to get too technical,
but I have to ask this questionfrom what we just from this this
line of tools. Do you thinkspectral analysis made that
easier or harder?
Mario Rodera (26:06):
It makes it easier because spectral is much more
forgiving for, for the dye andand reagent choice. And so
because it has higherresolution. So I think special
in the end will will be I mean,that was always where the
(26:26):
technology was going. And Iremember when the first exposure
I had was from Los Alamos wherethey did a lot of spectromachine
back in the, I think, eighties.And I thought this is very cool,
but they didn't have thecomputer chip power to to to do
it in a reasonable way. So I hadto wait until the late two
(26:49):
thousands and tens, I think,before they started becoming
feasible. But, yeah, Spectrumwill make it easier, but I worry
then that there might be otherthings that fall by the wayside
because people won't they won'tqualify their panels quite as
well as they used to because,you know, they they try a 12
pound panel. It works, andthat's enough for them. But you
(27:10):
can get it so much better.
Peter O'Toole (27:13):
What do you think the maximum number of colors
will be? Do think there's amaximum number that we can ever
use?
Mario Rodera (27:23):
I think so. I mean, it depends on the on the
dyes. I mean, given technology,it it all depends on how wide
the dye relation is. Right?
Peter O'Toole (27:32):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (27:32):
And due to the right now are about forty, fifty
nanometers wide. So it's amatter of digging up the
emission spectrum for eachexcitation laser. So right now,
we're at seven by seven lasersby maybe eight colors each, so
56 is probably a maximum layer.But, you know, somebody somebody
(27:53):
may come up with a newtechnology where the emission
spectrum is only one nanometer.
Peter O'Toole (27:57):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (27:58):
Right now, that's that's the entire future
of flow cytometers is to narrowthe the emission spectrum.
Nothing else.
Peter O'Toole (28:07):
Lanthanides do that. So lanthanides got really
narrow missions. You just needgood lanthanide chemists.
Mario Rodera (28:14):
And you don't have very many of them?
Peter O'Toole (28:17):
Don't need a lot. Really? A probe is tiny.
Tell us, who's been yourinspirations in your career?
Mario Rodera (28:29):
Well, of course, initially, it was my father
because he guided my you know,where I should go. But I would
say then it was primarily BobMurphy who introduced me to flow
cytometry and the technology andso on. And then Lennon Lee
Herzenberg, where really theytaught me how to run a lab and
(28:50):
how to do science really and howto present it to the outside
world. I mean, there's there'sthings that people forget about.
You have to know the designexperiments and implement them,
but you have to be able topublish them and talk about them
in ways that people willunderstand and appreciate. And
that's something that Leslietaught me very well. And I think
(29:12):
I've I've been fortunate to beable to give seminars all over
the world to many differentpeople who are interested in the
technology and hone that skill,but there's nothing we'd be able
to present.
Peter O'Toole (29:25):
Of of all the places you travel to, is there a
favorite place?
Mario Rodera (29:31):
No. I've been fortunate that I've been able to
travel widely, and I can't saythat there is a favorite place.
(29:52):
Well, that is interestingbecause there's two different
answers. In the flow world, itwould probably be in the
February, early '2 thousandsbecause that's when we're doing
development at a very high rateof the colors, the multicolor
technology. In terms of mycareer, it's really been the
last few years as I transitionedaway from doing flow cytometry.
(30:13):
And I've been tasked with doinga lot more medical parameters to
different viruses, and I havegroups that are doing Nipah
virus, norovirus, alfavirus, andSIV, HIV, and TB. I have people
doing those in my lab, and we'vebeen able to publish a lot of
high impact papers on that onthose topics in the last two or
(30:35):
three years.
So in the post pandemic world,there's been less technology
development, more biologydevelopment.
Peter O'Toole (30:43):
And so best times, you had two. What about
the most challenging ordifficult times?
Mario Rodera (30:51):
I think that for me is pretty easy. That's why I
was in in early in graduateschool and also in
undergraduate. And that isprimarily because no one ever
told me what was expected of me.So, for example, in graduate
school, when I went to defend mythesis proposal, the faculty, I
became with the with the intentof kicking me out because I was
(31:13):
viewed as someone who waslackadaisical and not very
hardworking and so on. But I dida very good job, obviously, and
and, you know, hit a home run onmy proposal defense, so they let
me stay. And I got my PhD, andthen and then my career went on.
But I would say that those thelast few years as an
undergraduate and first year asa as a graduate student, I was
(31:36):
not well prepared. I didn't knowexactly what I should be doing.
And they were difficult years inthe sense that I didn't know
what I was going to do. I didn'tknow how I was gonna get out of
it. And that I have to give BobMurphy a lot of credit for
because he kinda pulled me alongand and told taught me what work
ethic was and how to get itdone, and that helped a lot.
Peter O'Toole (31:58):
Yeah. That that that's really it's cool to hear
that the support you had, soyour inspirations, and just how
much support you had off yourinspirations as well. During
those difficult times or evenlater in your career when
there's always bad days at work.When you get home, what do you
do to relax? What are yourhobbies?
Mario Rodera (32:22):
You know, my hobby was always science. I worked a
lot as a as a in my postdoc andand as an early career. I worked
at home. I only worked a lot,and that was not so I didn't
have a whole lot of hobbies. Idid do a lot of running. I
jumped into a runner when I wasin as a postdoc at Stanford and
used to run quite a bit. Andthen when my son became was born
(32:48):
in twenty six years ago, andhe's done ultra distance runner,
and he does a lot of marathons,and he's done some hundred mile
races. And so it's kinda rubbedoff on him.
Peter O'Toole (32:59):
I've got to ask. What was his hundred how how
fast can he do 100 miles?
Mario Rodera (33:04):
He he did it a couple thousand. He did it in
twenty eight hours. He didLeadville, which is at ten it
starts at 10,000 feet. All thesudden goes off from there. Oh.
Goes up to 12,000 and then goesdown, and he has to turn around
and go back up and down. So it'sit's quite the the hundred mile
race.
Peter O'Toole (33:21):
Actually, sounds really cool. I've done 100
miler.
Mario Rodera (33:24):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (33:24):
So and then I would love to do it again, but
my running partner got soinjured. He refuses to do it. I
said, oh, come on. Come on. Youcan do it well, but no. And my
family aren't that way geared toit.
Mario Rodera (33:37):
It requires a lot of dedication. That's right.
Peter O'Toole (33:41):
But it's lovely. It's lovely. So what what was
your distance when you wererunning?
Mario Rodera (33:48):
Primarily about 10 k. I've done a marathon, and I
was training to do another one,but my running career ended
about fifteen years ago. And sobut that case were primarily my
distance, and I do that in aboutforty minutes. That was a pretty
good case.
Peter O'Toole (34:07):
But that's that's good time?
Mario Rodera (34:09):
Not spectacular, but, you know, that's good.
Peter O'Toole (34:12):
I haven't done that for a long time. Forty
minutes. I still struggle to getdown below the 42 these days. Do
you miss it?
Mario Rodera (34:22):
Yes. I do.
Peter O'Toole (34:26):
And do you not find another hobby to replace it
or displace some of
Mario Rodera (34:30):
Yeah. I do it now. I do hiking and swimming. You
know, as the body gets older,you try to be a little bit less
harsh on it.
Peter O'Toole (34:39):
I could I could you know, you keep yourself fit.
So it's good I try to. Goodhiking, clearly, it's two
things. What about cooking athome? Do you cook?
Mario Rodera (34:50):
Not much. I'm fortunate to have a partner
who's a very good cook, and so,you know, there's no reason for
me to do it, but I taste.
Peter O'Toole (35:00):
On that note, let's hit some quick fire
questions.
Mario Rodera (35:05):
Okay.
Peter O'Toole (35:06):
Are you an early bird or a night owl?
Mario Rodera (35:08):
Early bird. Absolutely.
Peter O'Toole (35:11):
PC or Mac?
Mario Rodera (35:13):
Mac. I converted the entire VRC to Mac, which I'm
very proud of, the VaccineResearch Center, because
primarily because of but alsobecause of other things. I'm
slowly back. I'm fully
Peter O'Toole (35:28):
That's because Flowjo used to be Mac
only, didn't it? And then
Mario Rodera (35:32):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (35:34):
Okay. McDonald's or Burger King?
Mario Rodera (35:38):
McDonald's. Their fries are much better.
Peter O'Toole (35:41):
Yeah. They really are, aren't they?
Mario Rodera (35:43):
Yes. They are.
Peter O'Toole (35:44):
Yeah. Tea or coffee?
Mario Rodera (35:48):
Oh, tea. Oh. I don't understand coffee. I'm a
beer supertaster, so I don'tdrink coffee and I don't drink
beer, so I drink tea and wine. Ifeel like a left hander in the
beverage world.
Peter O'Toole (36:02):
I love that analogy. That's really cool.
Chocolate or cheese?
Mario Rodera (36:07):
You know, I'll come back to that in a sec, but
in a sec. But I remember myfirst ISAC meeting was actually
in Cambridge in 1986 or '7 orso. And I thought, finally, I'm
gonna go to Cambridge, the homeof the tea drinkers. I'll able
to have tea easily enough. Andso the very first breakfast, we
(36:29):
sat down in a big hall there,and they were serving coffee. I
said, can I get some tea? And Ihad to go in the back room and
get some tea for me. And it'sjust because it was so the
meeting with by by non nonBritish people is primarily
coffee, but I thought I was sodisappointed by the fact that I
was being served coffee in myfirst trip to Britain as a
(36:50):
scientist.
Peter O'Toole (36:53):
That's brilliant. Chocolate or cheese? Okay. I'll
give you e. What what's yourflavor?
Mario Rodera (37:03):
Cheese in general. I love cheese, so but I like
chocolate too. But cheese, Ithink, is a little bit more
interesting in the long run.
Peter O'Toole (37:15):
Okay. What's your favorite food? If you could be
served any food, what would youlike to eat?
Mario Rodera (37:23):
Pizza.
Peter O'Toole (37:24):
Oh, okay. You can't just stop at pizza. What
topping?
Mario Rodera (37:28):
Oh, well, that would be my often favorite pizza
is sausage and green pepper.
Peter O'Toole (37:33):
Okay. Definitely a pepper pepper pepperoni.
Pepperoni fan definitely.Pepperoni.
Mario Rodera (37:40):
I'm probably pepperoni a bit salty. So
Peter O'Toole (37:44):
Yeah. I like the smokiness. If you get a nice
smoky pepperoni Yeah.
Mario Rodera (37:47):
That if you get if you that's the standard
pepperoni that all the Americanpizza chains use, but if you get
good pepperoni, then absolutely.
Peter O'Toole (37:57):
That that's a good choice for a favorite food.
And what about your leastfavorite food? What is your food
nightmare?
Mario Rodera (38:04):
You know, I grew up in a my mother was German,
and so I grew up not allowed tohave unfavored foods. But,
primarily, the things I wouldeat are are the the really
bitter foods like brusselssprouts. It's about the only
food stuff that I will not eat.
Peter O'Toole (38:21):
That well, that that that that there goes a
classic Christmas British dinnerthat always has brussels sprouts
on the plate.
Mario Rodera (38:28):
Well, I have to say I've had brussels sprouts
that were very good andtolerable, but they have to be
very caramelized.
Peter O'Toole (38:34):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (38:34):
They to be cooked and caramelized very heavily,
and then and then they'rethey're tolerable for me, and I
kinda like them.
Peter O'Toole (38:40):
Yeah. Chopped up nicely fried, caramelized. Yeah.
Okay. Get it?
Put fried. Do you prefer to eatin or eat out?
Mario Rodera (38:50):
I always prefer to eat in. It's a good food.
Peter O'Toole (38:54):
That you're lucky you said that because you
already said it's your wife thatcooks. And if you'd have said
eat out, she'd have gotten madat you for saying that.
Mario Rodera (39:03):
No. But for example, when I when I invite
myself over to my boss and hiswife are very good friends of
mine, I I always prefer to eatin because they're both very
good cooks.
Peter O'Toole (39:16):
Being as you don't do much cooking, do you do
the cleaning?
Mario Rodera (39:21):
Of course. That's only fair.
Peter O'Toole (39:25):
I I agree. That's why I prefer to cook because I
can't stand cleaning. TV orbook?
Mario Rodera (39:36):
Nowadays, it's TV. I haven't heard of book in
years.
Peter O'Toole (39:39):
Okay. And do you watch do you watch any trashy
TV?
Mario Rodera (39:45):
You mean what's my
Peter O'Toole (39:48):
Yeah. What's your TV sin?
Mario Rodera (39:51):
Not really. The only the only thing I do, I tend
to overwatch the reruns of ofold shows like friends and how I
met your mother and so on.
Peter O'Toole (40:03):
Okay.
Mario Rodera (40:04):
But I do like to stream the latest series on
Apple TV or so on Netflix.
Peter O'Toole (40:12):
And what about your favorite film? Favorite
movie?
Mario Rodera (40:17):
There are so many. It depends on what what choice,
but being there with Peterwhat's his name? It's it's based
on a novel by Jersey Kaczynski.It's one of my favorite movies
called Being There.
Peter O'Toole (40:34):
Okay.
Mario Rodera (40:34):
Came out in the mid eighties. It's a fabulous
movie. It's about, basically Ithought it used to predict the
rise of George Bush junior. Butin fact, now I think it's the
rise of Trump that was predictedby that.
Peter O'Toole (40:49):
That that could be worth a worth a watch,
actually. And I think anyonewho's watching or listening to
this may now be scrambling towatch it because it sounds
fascinating. Are you a Star Warsor Star Trek fan?
Mario Rodera (41:03):
Both.
Peter O'Toole (41:04):
If you had to choose one?
Mario Rodera (41:05):
Star Wars.
Peter O'Toole (41:07):
Oh, yeah. I think majority. And what about
favorite Christmas movie?
Mario Rodera (41:18):
I'm not a fan of the holiday movies, but probably
else.
Peter O'Toole (41:23):
Okay. That's quite popular too. Spectral or
compensation?
Mario Rodera (41:30):
Same thing.
Peter O'Toole (41:33):
Come on. One's additive. One's subtractive.
Mario Rodera (41:36):
No. No. It's exactly the same math.
Peter O'Toole (41:43):
I we'll argue that one is a different time.
But how can I argue it with you?Okay. So you
Mario Rodera (41:49):
can special well, specialized is the way that's
the future and how you have todo it. And the the data is much
you get much better resolutionthan spectral, but there's
really no difference betweenspectral and compensation.
Mathematically, the equivalent.
Peter O'Toole (42:08):
Fluorochromes or metal tags?
Mario Rodera (42:11):
Oh, very definitely fluorochromes. You
can't sort with metal tags. Andthat was that was was was some
funny. He said you'll never getany cells. We can't do anything
with them if you tag the metalsand and blend them up in a 4,000
degree oven.
Peter O'Toole (42:30):
What's your favorite music?
Mario Rodera (42:34):
Eighties.
Peter O'Toole (42:35):
Eighties? Okay. And what's your favorite color?
Mario Rodera (42:39):
Purple.
Peter O'Toole (42:40):
Of all the people, I thought you might say
PE or FITC or Rhodamine. No.Purple.
Mario Rodera (42:51):
I can give you the waveguide if you want.
Peter O'Toole (42:53):
Sorry?
Mario Rodera (42:54):
I can give you the wave length.
Peter O'Toole (42:56):
Oh, go on. What's your favorite wave length?
Mario Rodera (42:58):
Maybe about four seventy.
Peter O'Toole (43:03):
I that's a really good quote. I really like that
that. You gotta get a t shirtmade before seventy on it. Why
470?
Mario Rodera (43:12):
I don't know. Why buying anything. I I was
gonna I sous vide a lot when forfor cooking meat, And so I I
know the temperatures that Iwant different meats that that I
want with my sous vide. And Iwent to a restaurant that very
proudly said, we sous vide allour meats. And they said, well,
what temperature do want? I gavehim a I said one thirty one. He
(43:34):
said, I don't know what that is.He said, do want me rare or
rare? I said, oh, you youadvertise that you can you do it
to whatever temperature I want.And so, you know, this is kind
of disappointing to me that theyadvertise it as you could name
the temperature, but didn'texpect people to actually name
the temperature.
Peter O'Toole (43:55):
Yeah. I and I guess I well, you are you said
what wavelength, so I I guess Idid walk you into that. Do you
have any pet hates? Things youreally dislike, people's habits
you dislike? Or what do you findquite where is your tolerance
quite low on?
Mario Rodera (44:14):
Too many to list.
Peter O'Toole (44:16):
Sorry?
Mario Rodera (44:17):
Too many to list. My my primary pet peeve is
people who don't try. You know,it's not it's not making a
mistake or it's not, you know,doing doing something wrong.
It's when you haven't eventried.
Peter O'Toole (44:34):
So for all your lab that are listening to this
back, there you are. Make sureyou're putting in an effort
because otherwise, you're notgonna be happy with them.
Overall, your career, do youhave any regrets?
Mario Rodera (44:50):
No.
Peter O'Toole (44:52):
No?
Mario Rodera (44:55):
No. I can't. I've been very, very fortunate
throughout my career in thechoices I ended up with. Mhmm.
And, I can't say that it wouldcould have trust me better or
differently.
Peter O'Toole (45:10):
And if you could do any job for a day or a week,
not science, what job would youchoose to do?
Mario Rodera (45:22):
That's a great question. Imagine being
president of The United Statesto be a part of feeling you've
got to do it for one day.
Peter O'Toole (45:36):
Mhmm. As I say, you kinda you kinda need it for
a week, don't you, to get aproper flavor and then and then
and then cut and run?
Mario Rodera (45:43):
Yeah. Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (45:45):
That's cool. Ah, so if you were president for a
day or a week, what would youdo?
Mario Rodera (45:50):
Oh, that's easy. I've got the defense spending in
half, and I'd apply it to NIHbudget and to science.
Peter O'Toole (46:00):
I I I like the the dedication to science
itself. What is a what do youthink has given you most reward
at work? Has it been the thefounding of FlowJo and just how
many people have used it? Is itthe all the different multicolor
panels that people have pickedup and run with and be pushing
(46:22):
the limits of multicolor flowcytometry, or has it been your
latest developments in lookingat the disease and going So what
I'm thinking
Mario Rodera (46:31):
of is I enable science, and that's been my
greatest pleasure and honor isto be able to enable science at
many different levels, level oftechnology, at the level of
biology, at the training people.And, really, you know, there are
a couple of small things thatgave me great joy. It's like
(46:51):
when somebody asks a question onthe Purdue list about
compensation, and somebody elseanswers it absolutely correctly.
And that is in great joy nowthat it's you know, I've taught
people about compensation orspell or correction, whatever
you wanna call it. And there'senough people out there that
know how to teach it to otherpeople now.
Peter O'Toole (47:12):
Yeah. I I think
Mario Rodera (47:13):
But in fact, that's why I rarely respond on
the Purdue list. I used torespond all the time. But now
that other people respond, and Ithink that's really my joy is
that the that the I think thenext generation has taken up the
harness and and taken up the theefforts, and they're doing a
great great job of it.
Peter O'Toole (47:33):
I do see you reply sometimes still. So what
triggers
Mario Rodera (47:38):
Mostly pithy, and I try to inject a little humor.
Which some people don't findvery humorous, but my my sense
of humor can be very exciting.
Peter O'Toole (47:50):
That's a I think a wise head as well and be
knowing how to use it. And,actually, by not by not
commenting, you're letting otherpeople build up their
reputations.
Mario Rodera (48:00):
Exactly. Seeing my trainees, you know, become
successful on their own, right,has been a great journey too.
Raising a child that goes anddoes something great.
Peter O'Toole (48:13):
Any thoughts on social media?
Mario Rodera (48:18):
Yeah. It's the I mean, it's it's the it's really
coming, and it's absolutelynecessary. The problem is
identifying what is thetruthiness of the of the social
media is what's at stake here.Right? And that's a real
(48:39):
problem, but nobody knows.There's so much social media
that all that a lot of it isjust not correct that you're
saturate. I hope people willfinally get to the point where
they stop relying on socialmedia for their input, but I
suspect that it'll always bethere'll always be too many
people that get theirinformation from Twitter or or
(49:00):
whatever.
Peter O'Toole (49:01):
There's a lot of good science on social media.
Whichever platform that you'relooking at, whether it be
LinkedIn or Twitter or Blue Skyor whichever one, I think
there's some good scientificcommunities out there. I noticed
I I looked at you on socialmedia, and I found two Mario's
on Twitter. One which I think isgenuinely you, another one that
(49:24):
is at facts god.
Mario Rodera (49:27):
That's probably me too.
Peter O'Toole (49:29):
That's brilliant. I saw that. I thought so wanted
to have loads of activitiesinstead of facts god. And then I
saw the other one that has moreactivity, which is at Mario
Roader. But that that was abrilliant name, and I thought
that was a beautiful as one
Mario Rodera (49:43):
of the I found it and and registered it for myself
so somebody else wouldn't getit.
Peter O'Toole (49:49):
I I think it's one of the gods of glaze
cytometry. It's a really goodname. But but then you might
have to share it with god one,god two, god three.
Mario Rodera (49:58):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (50:00):
A few of you that's out there. Before I
finish, do you have any words ofwisdom for any young scientists
out there or even any olderscientists out there?
Mario Rodera (50:14):
Yeah. Share what you're doing. One of the things
that Len taught me was to bevery collaborative and to always
talk about what you're doing.Don't withhold information and
data. The science will proceedmuch more rapidly. Everyone is
so intent on taking ownership orsomething so that everyone knows
that they did it. And that's notreally what science is about.
(50:37):
Science is about sharing anddoing it collaboratively, and
you'll get recognized anyway.But I I remember being
absolutely horrified becauseGlenn would give a talk
sometimes, and he told he toldeveryone about the data I
collected a week or two before,which which I thought was pretty
hot data. And and now he'sspilling out to the entire
(50:58):
world. And I thought, oh,they're gonna run with it and
take it away. And that neverhappened. But what did happen
was that people wanted to startcollaborating with Len or or
been with me and wanted to workwith me. And I've been extremely
fortunate to have had a wholeslew of very, very productive
collaborations in my in my life.And if you look at my
(51:18):
publication history, I have,like, 400 papers or so. And I
would say a vast majority,probably 80% were collaborations
that came out. Only about 20%are from my own lab, or only
from my lab.
Peter O'Toole (51:33):
But of those 400 publications, I think it's got a
h index of over 100, I think.And if to those who don't know
what that means, that means itis phenomenally high compared to
almost all academics. To be overa hundred is a stellar
performance. And I also noticedyou in the Stanford University
Invention Hall of Fame. Yeah.That's pretty impressive.
Mario Rodera (51:56):
That's for science seven PE or science seven ABC,
which made Stanford about10,000,000 in royalties.
Peter O'Toole (52:05):
Do you get some of those royalties yourself?
Mario Rodera (52:07):
I did for a while.
Peter O'Toole (52:09):
That's nice, isn't it? That that's super
cool. And I have to ask one morequestion, which I nearly forgot.
Your dad was a physicist. Yourbrother was a neurobiologist.
You've gone to from biophysicsinto biology as well. What about
your son?
Mario Rodera (52:28):
About what? My son?
Peter O'Toole (52:29):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (52:30):
He's defending his PhD in virology at Harvard in
two weeks.
Peter O'Toole (52:34):
Oh, wow. So he's also following the same
footsteps?
Mario Rodera (52:37):
Yeah. But he doesn't want to do science. He
wants to go to a startup companyor do business development.
Okay. Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (52:47):
But you have the company, so that's not so
dissimilar. He's just Oh,
Mario Rodera (52:52):
he just wants to start there. I did not start
there.
Peter O'Toole (52:54):
Yeah. Okay. But I guess he's seeing what you can
do with the company as wellthrough that.
Mario Rodera (53:00):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (53:00):
Oh, I I hope his defense goes well into
Mario Rodera (53:03):
Oh, so too.
Peter O'Toole (53:05):
And, Mario, thank you so much for joining me
today. Thank you to everyonewho's listened or watched, and
please, you can see PaulRobinson and some of the other
people we've talked about, andyou'll see Dave Novo up and
coming if you're watching thisas he's just released. But,
Mario, on behalf of thecommunity, thank you so much for
being an inspiration to us.Thank you for helping lead and
(53:29):
develop and giving us the toolsthat we are also dependent on
and just take for granted inmany cases. And I hope you
realize just how big an impactyou've had on the cytometry
market, and thank you for takingyour time to join me today.
Mario Rodera (53:42):
It's been a real pleasure, and thank you for
saying that. Those are very nicethings.
Peter O'Toole (53:47):
Thank you.
Welcome to Flow Stars. Candid conversations between
doctor Peter O'Toole and the bighitters of flow cytometry.
Brought to you by BeckmanCoulter at Bite Size Bio.
Peter O'Toole (00:10):
Hello. And welcome to this packed episode
of Flow Stars with the one andonly one of the biggest names in
flow cytometry, Mario Rodera. Hetalks us through the highs and
lows of his long career,including how poorly he was
thought of in grad school,demonstrating cytometry to past
presidents Bush and Obama, andthe importance of developing
(00:33):
pipelines to prevent copy pasteerrors. All this and more coming
up in this episode. Hi. I'mPeter O'Toole, and welcome to
this episode of Flowstar. Today,I'm joined by Mario Rodera from
NIH still. Yes.
Mario Rodera (00:51):
Yep.
Peter O'Toole (00:52):
I do you know what? It's a real honor to meet
with you. I reflected back towhen I started my flow cytometry
career, and there were for me,personally, there were three big
names in flow cytometry. Therewas Howard Shapiro, Paul
Robinson, and yourself. And I'vebeen so fortunate to meet all of
(01:13):
you, and to actually get you torecord today is a real honor. So
thank you for agreeing to today,Mario.
Mario Rodera (01:18):
Oh, it's my pleasure.
Peter O'Toole (01:21):
So just to give you an idea of how important
Mario is, if you haven't metMario, I've been looking you
have you've actually met BarackObama, haven't you?
Mario Rodera (01:31):
Yes. And George Bush.
Peter O'Toole (01:33):
And George Bush?
Mario Rodera (01:35):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (01:35):
This is huge.
Mario Rodera (01:37):
I got to show them how pulsatile works. In fact,
with Brock, we had the LSR twoopen up so he could look in and
see the lasers and the pads. AndI had this nice display where we
had six different tubes ofquantum dots lined up. So if you
hold it to the laser, it lookslike the laser changes color as
(01:58):
it goes through because theyemit different different. Oh,
Peter O'Toole (02:02):
that's super smart. Just because, yeah, keep
them engaged. And even if it'snot true science per se, it
shows and gets them excited, Iguess.
Mario Rodera (02:11):
Yes. And, actually, asked some very
pertinent questions. He waspretty impressive. I was
impressed by him quite a bit.
Peter O'Toole (02:17):
How long did you get with him?
Mario Rodera (02:20):
About five minutes.
Peter O'Toole (02:22):
Still, I'll take my five minutes of fame at that
point.
Mario Rodera (02:26):
And then I got to ride in the motorcade over to a
different part of the other agewhere he had where he made a
major speech, and that that waskind of fun too.
Peter O'Toole (02:35):
That that's gotta be one of your highlights in
your career, hasn't it?
Mario Rodera (02:40):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (02:43):
That that's pretty special. And it also
shows you not just yourimportance, but the importance
of flow cytometry, which isobviously what you're famous for
worldwide, is the placecytometry side of things. What
got you into flow cytometry tostart with?
Mario Rodera (02:58):
Well, I have to blame Bob Murphy, my PhD adviser
at Carnegie Mell. I went toCarnegie Mell as a for my PhD,
and I turned his lab. And heused to look at endocytosis. And
so I started working with him onthat aspect. And I remember for
my PhD thesis proposal defense,which you give after one year, I
(03:23):
actually proposed to do a sevencolor experiment, which was
absolutely unheard of. And bythe end of my PhD career, I was
doing two or three colors, so Iwas a little bit ambitious, but
it set me on the path.
Peter O'Toole (03:37):
I so just just just for ease, this has got to
be the late eighties?
Mario Rodera (03:43):
No. Nineteen eighty four.
Peter O'Toole (03:45):
Nineteen '80 '4 and wanted to do seven color
flow cytometry.
Mario Rodera (03:49):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (03:50):
And I think we had to wait, oh, to the start of
the naughties?
Mario Rodera (03:57):
No. We were doing nine colour in nine five in 1998
or so.
Peter O'Toole (04:04):
That's I wasn't far off. I wasn't far off. And I
guess that that's, you know,that's how I know your
reputation is color. The numberof colors that you can actually
apply and do it sensibly. Yep.
How many, world records for thenumber of colors on a flow
cytometer? How many times haveyou broken that personally in
(04:25):
your lab?
Mario Rodera (04:26):
Oh, probably about 18 or so. But the one I'm most
proud of is we had a student inthe lab who is 22 years old and
planned and implemented a 23color experiment. That was the
first time anyone had ever donemore colors than their age.
Peter O'Toole (04:45):
That that's super cool, isn't it? And I guess
that's gonna be more and morecommon now as the number of
colors you can do by facecytometry has increased. I we
will come back to multicolors ina bit. But you got into phase
cytometry through your PhD andwhat you want to do. But if I
(05:06):
take you back to when you were10, 11, 12 years of age, can you
remember what the first job wasthat you ever wanted to do?
Mario Rodera (05:16):
I always knew I'd be a scientist. My father is a
physicist. He's now 95 and stillstill writing physics articles.
My brother who is 10 years oldwent into neurobiology
initially. And so I suspected Iwould always be a scientist at
(05:38):
one level or another.
Peter O'Toole (05:39):
Oh, wow. I've I've got to ask. What line of
physics was your dad or is yourdad still in?
Mario Rodera (05:45):
Space physics.
Peter O'Toole (05:47):
Space physics?
Mario Rodera (05:48):
And and yeah. Near Earth physics.
Peter O'Toole (05:52):
So you never want to be an astronaut?
Mario Rodera (05:55):
Of course. In fact, you know, the there's a
group down in, where are they?That's a guard that does
flow cytometry for space physicsfor for the astronauts. And I
always often thought I would goand, you know, work their site
I'd be their flow drafting ifthey needed someone to say this.
Peter O'Toole (06:18):
Well, come on. With with the way things get
going in space travel, it's notbeyond it yet, is it?
Mario Rodera (06:24):
Not yet. No.
Peter O'Toole (06:26):
Can I can always hope? So, okay, so so your dad
was a physicist. Your brotherwho's eight years older went
into neurobiology, but what wasyour what was your first degree
in?
Mario Rodera (06:39):
Chemistry. My father convinced me that I
should get a degree in a hardscience, not in a soft science.
And so I decided to go withchemistry because I was
basically a pyromaniac. And Ithought chemistry would be a
good way to learn how to makeexplosives and things like that.
But then I kind of lost interestin chemistry when I saw my I
(07:02):
took my first genetics course inas a freshman in college, and I
fell in love with biology andgenetics. And I always thought
to be a gene jockey when I wentto graduate school.
Peter O'Toole (07:15):
So so what changed? Just just through your
PhD that changed?
Mario Rodera (07:18):
Yeah. I think during and seeing the being able
to do technology development,I've always been somewhat good
at technology, and the genejockies didn't need any
technology development. Theyjust needed creative people who
could do biology, and that's notme. So working in, I got exposed
to developing technologies, boththe hardware and the software
(07:42):
based. I also wrote acquisitionpackages back then in the early
eighties that that BB gave awaywith their instruments. And so
that kinda got me hooked. Andthen from the biology side of
it, both I thought it washeavily used in immunology. So
just through the technology, Igot exposed to immunology, which
(08:02):
I love. That is my that's mylove. And so I went to Len's Lab
as a postdoc to immunology andcytometry, Len Herzenberg, and
the rest is basically history.
Peter O'Toole (08:15):
What was Len like to work for?
Mario Rodera (08:17):
Len was fantastic. I admire him so much. He he
always had the philosophy thatthe science belong to the people
because the people paid for it.So he had the initial group of
the initial patent holders onthe flow cytometer. He asked
that they sign over their rightsand money to the lab, and so he
was able to fund the lab quitewell and and always felt that
(08:41):
the science was owned by themasses of people who paid for
it.
Peter O'Toole (08:47):
And what was if I take you back to the start, what
was the first flow cytometer youused?
Mario Rodera (08:55):
That in Bob Lab, it was a 4 FACS440. That was the
first order, and we had we had athree color analyzer. No. That
was not we didn't use that. Butthen the four forty, fax four
forty, which is a fax four basedmachine. And then when I went to
(09:17):
Len's, we actually had a faxtwo, which became our first
eleven color machine as we sawdifferent detectors and and
other products to it. But thatwas a fax two that's now in the
Smithsonian.
Peter O'Toole (09:30):
Oh, wow. Have have you been have you actually
seen it in the Smithsonian?
Mario Rodera (09:35):
No.
Peter O'Toole (09:36):
No? Are you tempted to go and see it?
Mario Rodera (09:39):
Yeah. I think it's not you have to wait until it's
on display. Every so often,they'll bring it out on some
sort of special display. Soright now, it's just in a
warehouse. It looks like Raidersof the Lost Ark, that last
scene.
Peter O'Toole (09:53):
Well, that would be cool, though, wouldn't it?
Yeah. We should look at ananniversary date and try and
persuade them to celebrate theanniversary and bring it out on
display.
Mario Rodera (10:03):
I should have thought about four or five years
ago because I'm pretty surethose those are concocted five
years in advance.
Peter O'Toole (10:11):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (10:12):
But, yeah, that would've been fun.
Peter O'Toole (10:16):
And so that was your first cytometer. Do you
have a favorite cytometer thatyou've ever used?
Mario Rodera (10:22):
I think the LSR two was my favorite just because
it was so easy to use, and itwas very it was the first
cytometer we had where we hadreally good resolution of
different colors and so on. Andit was also digital. So I think
the the different aspects of itmade it my favorite. Plus, you
know, I'm basically responsiblefor the LSR two in b b because I
(10:46):
went to them and told them theyhad to build this for me. And
they did a market analysis andsaid they would do it if they
could because they thought theywould sell 50 of them in the
next few years, and they end upselling 2,000.
Peter O'Toole (11:01):
Yeah. The market's exploded, though,
didn't it, for Flow? It has. Andit's just growing, isn't it?
Mario Rodera (11:06):
Yep.
Peter O'Toole (11:07):
Just just incredible. So I've gotta ask
you. Have you ever had a MoFlow?
Mario Rodera (11:13):
Yeah. Well, we had a our original
cytometer in Len's lab, whichwas a FACS two, had the multiple
electronics because theelectronics is the we could do
high speed sorting, and we coulddo digital acquisition and so
on.
Peter O'Toole (11:29):
Okay. I've gotta say that that for me.
Mario Rodera (11:31):
So it's a it's a MoFlow attached on top of a fax
two bench.
Peter O'Toole (11:40):
Just a different era. I miss the MoFlo.
Mario Rodera (11:44):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (11:44):
I do miss it. So you mentioned earlier about the
software side, and you wereactually playing with the
software for the analysisbecause, obviously, the analysis
old school was very literallyanalog, very analog. So it's not
everyone who is into actuallycomputer programming and helping
(12:06):
with the analysis and thesetting of the software side of
it. Why why get into that sideof it? You know, you could just
be a user asking for morecolors. Why did you feel
compelled to help and addressthat side, the analysis side? I
didn't feel compelled. For me,it's just easy. Wiring software
for me is easy, and I have to bevery careful because it's
(12:26):
distracting enough that if Ihave a hard problem in biology
and I don't wanna deal to us,they're writing code. And coding
is very it's addictive for mebecause it's it's easy, and you
can see right away the thebenefit that you're having. But,
initially, I was doing itprimarily because we needed to
be able as we moved on beyondthree and four hours, we needed
(12:48):
software that could docompensation, which did not
really exist at that time. And
Mario Rodera (12:54):
we needed to do it in an automated and high speed
way, so that's why we initiallystarted running FlowJo, and then
ZAP was to have the ability tohandle the datasets we were
generating, which were beyondany software that existed at
that point.
Peter O'Toole (13:09):
And I I so now you've brought on to the the
FlowJo because you were you arethe founder or founder of
FlowJo. And for those No.
Mario Rodera (13:17):
No. No. No. Adam Preester we hired Adam Preester
into Stanford because he was a areal coder, and he and I
generated the first version thatwas commercialized.
Peter O'Toole (13:29):
And for those listening, if you don't know
what FlowJo is, FlowJo is one ofthe leading analytical software
programs. You'll find this inhospitals. You'll find this in
almost every university that'sout there. It is absolutely
fundamental and fundamentallyimportant. And the software
itself, I don't know if you'veever reflected on this. The
amount of fundamental researchthat FlowJo has enabled, it is
(13:55):
uncountable. It's huge. Yeah.And that's because of yourself.
Mario Rodera (13:59):
Well, someone would have to do it, but, yeah,
I happen to be fortunate enoughto be in a position where I
could do it and did do it. But Ido think I do remember going to
talks in the mid nineties andlater on in the two thousands
and so on where I'd see talks onpeople giving talks, and they
show a plot that I knew wasFlowJo because they're it's like
your child. If you have twins,as a parent, you can tell them
(14:21):
apart, but other people may notbe able to. So I could always
tell a plot that comes fromFlowDrop versus a plot that
comes from somewhere else. And Iwould see it more and more used
and presented, and I thought,well, this is something that I
think is gonna be big.
Peter O'Toole (14:38):
Is yeah. Alright. And and he's still huge.
Mario Rodera (14:41):
I think Still. Right.
Peter O'Toole (14:41):
Still the leading program, I believe, in market.
I've gotta be careful. As partof this series, I'm doing Dave
Novo as well. Obviously, whodoes the the the leading rival
software arguably? But it's notabout the software, is it? It's
about the history of it and justthe success. And what was it
(15:02):
like? So you started a companyfor FlowJo. How big a step was
that? Because that's, again, avery different step from just
being in academia doingresearch. Now having a spin out
Mario Rodera (15:14):
So that was primarily Adam, the cofounder of
FlowJo. He he had a company thathe used to sell very niche
software from, and so that wasTreeStar Incorporated or
TreeStar LLC. So we we licensedthe the software technology from
Stanford who owned it at thetime and then developed it more
(15:35):
and commercialized it andstarted selling it through the
portal, basically. So Adamreally took care of the business
and of the of the software for alot for twenty years.
Peter O'Toole (15:47):
Did it take a lot of your time, though? Because
there's there's one thing havingsoftware that works in your
hands for your lab. There'sanother thing once it becomes a
commercial product that the theuser interface has to be
glossier, more user friendly.Were you involved in a lot of
that, or was that part of thenpart of Adam's side and his
team?
Mario Rodera (16:05):
I was involved somewhat. In general, I'm not a
user interface kind of guy asyou correctly pointed out
because that requires a lot ofpatience and a lot of,
knowledge. So I did more of thethe algorithms and the basic you
know, I needed something so Iwould code it and and and
implement it back in Stanford. Idid a lot of that. So, yeah, it
(16:27):
consumed a lot of time, but italso saves a lot of time as a
consequence. So although itwould take me an hour or two to
write a new algorithm or or anew interface or so, it would
save me that time in spades downthe road as I did that as I use
it over and over in the lab aswell.
Peter O'Toole (16:45):
I it's fascinating listening to you,
actually. I have a data scienceteam, at York, and they're
always telling me that it's it'svital for them to develop the
pipelines to do the analysis.It's quicker to do that than to
to do grunt grunt through thedata analysis itself. Yeah. And,
you know, what you're sayingperfectly chimes with what
(17:07):
they're telling me all the timethat, no. No. No. Better to do
the pipeline, get the coding,and let it do it for you because
then it can just
Mario Rodera (17:14):
I continued at an age where I have my own lab. I
would write pipelines in indifferent softwares like the JMP
based software, JSL, which isjump a program that's put up by
SAS. I would write pipelines inthere to assist with people, but
to do their analysis or toautomate their analysis. I've
(17:34):
always felt that you don't wannado you need to have automated
analysis so you can always startfrom the raw data at the
beginning no matter how as youadd more and more data to it.
You always reanalyze the pipeuse the pipeline from the
beginning so that you don't makecopy paste errors. One of the
biggest problems in this inscience right now is too much of
it is done with copy paste. Andso you get halfway down an
(18:00):
analysis scheme, and you realizeyou did something wrong, and
then you have to go back and doit again. So that that's been my
main effort in not main, butthat's probably one of my big
efforts in the in the lab I runis to help them with the
pipelines because I know how towrite those.
Peter O'Toole (18:17):
So I you know, I've not thought about this
until just how do you so thecytometers themselves are now so
user friendly that you don'thave to be very expert at all to
be able to operate the analyzersalso. They they are super use
they've made them super good forimmunologists, other biologists,
(18:38):
life scientists to use. Thelikes of Flowjo make it really
easy to analyze the data. Do youthink there's ever a concern
that people are so disengagedwith what they're doing and they
just get putting tubes on themachine and spitting out data
analysis at the end that theymay misinterpret or design their
(18:58):
experiments badly? Do you thinkwe're getting more of that
because they're less techy andless thinking about what's
really going on.
Mario Rodera (19:06):
I think it's a real problem. I think it's
always been a problem, andthere's no easy solution. I
mean, to me, the solution is notto make sure the users know how
to do the how to do all thosethings or how the instrument
works. The solution is to embedthe people who are in the in the
lab so that they can participatein the design and implementation
(19:29):
of the experiments. But it meansyou always have to have people
who who sit on the fence oftechnology and biology. You need
to have people who understandboth sides and can translate.
They don't necessarily have tobe experts at either one, but
they have to be able totranslate. And that's something
I've always been proud to beable to do is to sit on that
fence and and talk to thebiologist and say, what do you
(19:51):
need and translate that to the.So a lot of the time people will
say, oh, I need to be able to dothis. I usually will call to me
and say, I need to do this.Well, no. Not quite true. You
don't need to do this, but youneed to do that, which is very
similar. And then if youimplement that, then it helps
them do whatever they wanted todo. And the reason is because
(20:12):
users don't necessarily know howto color what the appropriate
pipeline impact is. And then ifyou have people that that will
happen to able to decide whereyou have software engineers
who'll say, oh, the users whowant to do this, And I'll sit
there and go, no. That's notreally what they want to do.
They wanna do that, and youshould cut cut it this way. So
(20:35):
it's you need to have people whoare sitting on that fence who
know both the technology and thebiology who get embedded in the
in the biologists in in terms ofexperiment setup and
implementation and so on. Andthat's why that's why Johnny
Moore and I wrote our articleabout shared resource
laboratories back in 02/2003 or'4 or so when we put forward
(20:59):
that whole that whole conceptthat it's not, just a core
laboratory or it's a sharedresource laboratory. And the
idea of calling it sharedresource was to convey the fact
that you want to share the thedesign and share the knowledge
of the technology with thebiologist so that you get the
best of both worlds.
Peter O'Toole (21:21):
In shared resource, Cyto I'm very lucky.
We got a shared resourcefacility, and I've got an
excellent team that sits on thatfence and interface between the
two and a very integrated Iwould say the users are more
dependent on the technical staffthan they are on the
instruments. You know, the waythe system works now is they are
(21:42):
almost dependent on them to justhelp design their experiments.
There's a lot of teaching, lotsof training. We have lots of
external courses to help train,but when it comes to the
complicated stuff, they stillheavily lean on the team that we
have. And that is the perfectshape.
Mario Rodera (21:56):
It's great you can provide that. But my fear is
that business has become sosimple and and inexpensive that
people can buy them for theirown laboratory and never get the
the training or or assistancethat they really need.
Peter O'Toole (22:12):
Do you think, this is an if you think about
it, this is a blessing offinancially challenging times in
that it makes it harder eventhough the instruments are
getting cheaper. So I'm sorryfor all the manufacturers out
there making cheaper ones. Thethe running costs are not
insignificant. The servicecontract costs of these
(22:32):
instruments, it becomes a burdento individual labs. And that
actually so because of thatburden, it's encouraging more
and more not to put them intheir own labs, but to put them
in a shared resource. And thereare no other flow cytometers at
York but in the facility, andthere's five analyzers, I think,
three sorters, all just in andand no one would want I don't
(22:56):
think any of the users wouldwant their own because they've
got five at their disposal. Soif one was to break, there's
another four. They can havemultiple people on them at the
same time. It's very much acultural persuasion to explain
the benefits of those sharedresources and are more than just
the cost.
Mario Rodera (23:16):
I think too many people view or used to view
photosynthetic as a center ofeach. You come with your
samples, you put them in, youpress a few buttons, and you
come out with your cells at thebottom and the and the fluid at
the top. And that's you know,for for flow, it's a far more
complex technology that requiresa lot more thinking and and
(23:37):
processing and understanding theimpact of every step on your on
your experiment and and so on,optimizing the the panels and
and using reagents. I mean, it'samazing how people still don't
know what reagent titration isabout and and what the antibody
binding can what mechanism cantell us about binding. And so
(23:59):
those are all important facetsof a flow cytometer experiment,
and yet they're still not widelyunderstood.
Peter O'Toole (24:07):
I've always thought remember the first,
without naming any names oranything else, but the first
user friendly cell sorters. Andthey got quite a bad reputation
early on. And actually,personally, I think it was less
the cytometer's performance,more the fact that users were
now trying to sort withoutunderstanding how to even gate
(24:28):
strategically for cell sorting.
Mario Rodera (24:30):
Well, that's you know, I told the manufacturers
this when they came out with theinstruments. They said this
instrument won't need a core todo it. You could do it in your
own. I said that's a mistakebecause then if you make it if
you that's how you advertise it,then people will just generate
garbage data and won't andthey'll complain about your
instrument, and then peopleyou'll get a bad reputation. I
(24:51):
said, you don't do it that way.You gotta put it put it in
cores. But, you know, peoplewill have the money. They're
willing to buy it for their ownlab, and then they complain
about why it didn't work.
Peter O'Toole (25:03):
And it it is and and it really was the case, I
think.
Mario Rodera (25:06):
Yeah. I mean, I remember in the in the February
when we were doing 18 colorexperiments and so on, postdocs
would come to my lab becausethey wanted to do these
experiments, and they said, Iwanna do I wanna do an 18 color
experiment. And this is, youknow, this is the panel I want
to use. And I just let them go,and they come back to me and
say, this didn't work at all.This is complete crap. And I
(25:29):
said, no. The the problem isthat you have you have to build
it up step by step. And then wego back and build it up step by
step, and it'll work. It takessix months, but it would work
eventually. And the problem wasthat they simply you know, they
and I what I thought about wasthis is what goes on in eighty
percent of the lives worldwidewhere people try an AT and and
it doesn't work, and they saythis is crap. It'll never work.
Peter O'Toole (25:53):
I I'm going to, I try not to get too technical,
but I have to ask this questionfrom what we just from this this
line of tools. Do you thinkspectral analysis made that
easier or harder?
Mario Rodera (26:06):
It makes it easier because spectral is much more
forgiving for, for the dye andand reagent choice. And so
because it has higherresolution. So I think special
in the end will will be I mean,that was always where the
(26:26):
technology was going. And Iremember when the first exposure
I had was from Los Alamos wherethey did a lot of spectromachine
back in the, I think, eighties.And I thought this is very cool,
but they didn't have thecomputer chip power to to to do
it in a reasonable way. So I hadto wait until the late two
(26:49):
thousands and tens, I think,before they started becoming
feasible. But, yeah, Spectrumwill make it easier, but I worry
then that there might be otherthings that fall by the wayside
because people won't they won'tqualify their panels quite as
well as they used to because,you know, they they try a 12
pound panel. It works, andthat's enough for them. But you
(27:10):
can get it so much better.
Peter O'Toole (27:13):
What do you think the maximum number of colors
will be? Do think there's amaximum number that we can ever
use?
Mario Rodera (27:23):
I think so. I mean, it depends on the on the
dyes. I mean, given technology,it it all depends on how wide
the dye relation is. Right?
Peter O'Toole (27:32):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (27:32):
And due to the right now are about forty, fifty
nanometers wide. So it's amatter of digging up the
emission spectrum for eachexcitation laser. So right now,
we're at seven by seven lasersby maybe eight colors each, so
56 is probably a maximum layer.But, you know, somebody somebody
(27:53):
may come up with a newtechnology where the emission
spectrum is only one nanometer.
Peter O'Toole (27:57):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (27:58):
Right now, that's that's the entire future
of flow cytometers is to narrowthe the emission spectrum.
Nothing else.
Peter O'Toole (28:07):
Lanthanides do that. So lanthanides got really
narrow missions. You just needgood lanthanide chemists.
Mario Rodera (28:14):
And you don't have very many of them?
Peter O'Toole (28:17):
Don't need a lot. Really? A probe is tiny.
Tell us, who's been yourinspirations in your career?
Mario Rodera (28:29):
Well, of course, initially, it was my father
because he guided my you know,where I should go. But I would
say then it was primarily BobMurphy who introduced me to flow
cytometry and the technology andso on. And then Lennon Lee
Herzenberg, where really theytaught me how to run a lab and
(28:50):
how to do science really and howto present it to the outside
world. I mean, there's there'sthings that people forget about.
You have to know the designexperiments and implement them,
but you have to be able topublish them and talk about them
in ways that people willunderstand and appreciate. And
that's something that Leslietaught me very well. And I think
(29:12):
I've I've been fortunate to beable to give seminars all over
the world to many differentpeople who are interested in the
technology and hone that skill,but there's nothing we'd be able
to present.
Peter O'Toole (29:25):
Of of all the places you travel to, is there a
favorite place?
Mario Rodera (29:31):
No. I've been fortunate that I've been able to
travel widely, and I can't saythat there is a favorite place.
(29:52):
Well, that is interestingbecause there's two different
answers. In the flow world, itwould probably be in the
February, early '2 thousandsbecause that's when we're doing
development at a very high rateof the colors, the multicolor
technology. In terms of mycareer, it's really been the
last few years as I transitionedaway from doing flow cytometry.
(30:13):
And I've been tasked with doinga lot more medical parameters to
different viruses, and I havegroups that are doing Nipah
virus, norovirus, alfavirus, andSIV, HIV, and TB. I have people
doing those in my lab, and we'vebeen able to publish a lot of
high impact papers on that onthose topics in the last two or
(30:35):
three years.
So in the post pandemic world,there's been less technology
development, more biologydevelopment.
Peter O'Toole (30:43):
And so best times, you had two. What about
the most challenging ordifficult times?
Mario Rodera (30:51):
I think that for me is pretty easy. That's why I
was in in early in graduateschool and also in
undergraduate. And that isprimarily because no one ever
told me what was expected of me.So, for example, in graduate
school, when I went to defend mythesis proposal, the faculty, I
became with the with the intentof kicking me out because I was
(31:13):
viewed as someone who waslackadaisical and not very
hardworking and so on. But I dida very good job, obviously, and
and, you know, hit a home run onmy proposal defense, so they let
me stay. And I got my PhD, andthen and then my career went on.
But I would say that those thelast few years as an
undergraduate and first year asa as a graduate student, I was
(31:36):
not well prepared. I didn't knowexactly what I should be doing.
And they were difficult years inthe sense that I didn't know
what I was going to do. I didn'tknow how I was gonna get out of
it. And that I have to give BobMurphy a lot of credit for
because he kinda pulled me alongand and told taught me what work
ethic was and how to get itdone, and that helped a lot.
Peter O'Toole (31:58):
Yeah. That that that's really it's cool to hear
that the support you had, soyour inspirations, and just how
much support you had off yourinspirations as well. During
those difficult times or evenlater in your career when
there's always bad days at work.When you get home, what do you
do to relax? What are yourhobbies?
Mario Rodera (32:22):
You know, my hobby was always science. I worked a
lot as a as a in my postdoc andand as an early career. I worked
at home. I only worked a lot,and that was not so I didn't
have a whole lot of hobbies. Idid do a lot of running. I
jumped into a runner when I wasin as a postdoc at Stanford and
used to run quite a bit. Andthen when my son became was born
(32:48):
in twenty six years ago, andhe's done ultra distance runner,
and he does a lot of marathons,and he's done some hundred mile
races. And so it's kinda rubbedoff on him.
Peter O'Toole (32:59):
I've got to ask. What was his hundred how how
fast can he do 100 miles?
Mario Rodera (33:04):
He he did it a couple thousand. He did it in
twenty eight hours. He didLeadville, which is at ten it
starts at 10,000 feet. All thesudden goes off from there. Oh.
Goes up to 12,000 and then goesdown, and he has to turn around
and go back up and down. So it'sit's quite the the hundred mile
race.
Peter O'Toole (33:21):
Actually, sounds really cool. I've done 100
miler.
Mario Rodera (33:24):
Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (33:24):
So and then I would love to do it again, but
my running partner got soinjured. He refuses to do it. I
said, oh, come on. Come on. Youcan do it well, but no. And my
family aren't that way geared toit.
Mario Rodera (33:37):
It requires a lot of dedication. That's right.
Peter O'Toole (33:41):
But it's lovely. It's lovely. So what what was
your distance when you wererunning?
Mario Rodera (33:48):
Primarily about 10 k. I've done a marathon, and I
was training to do another one,but my running career ended
about fifteen years ago. And sobut that case were primarily my
distance, and I do that in aboutforty minutes. That was a pretty
good case.
Peter O'Toole (34:07):
But that's that's good time?
Mario Rodera (34:09):
Not spectacular, but, you know, that's good.
Peter O'Toole (34:12):
I haven't done that for a long time. Forty
minutes. I still struggle to getdown below the 42 these days. Do
you miss it?
Mario Rodera (34:22):
Yes. I do.
Peter O'Toole (34:26):
And do you not find another hobby to replace it
or displace some of
Mario Rodera (34:30):
Yeah. I do it now. I do hiking and swimming. You
know, as the body gets older,you try to be a little bit less
harsh on it.
Peter O'Toole (34:39):
I could I could you know, you keep yourself fit.
So it's good I try to. Goodhiking, clearly, it's two
things. What about cooking athome? Do you cook?
Mario Rodera (34:50):
Not much. I'm fortunate to have a partner
who's a very good cook, and so,you know, there's no reason for
me to do it, but I taste.
Peter O'Toole (35:00):
On that note, let's hit some quick fire
questions.
Mario Rodera (35:05):
Okay.
Peter O'Toole (35:06):
Are you an early bird or a night owl?
Mario Rodera (35:08):
Early bird. Absolutely.
Peter O'Toole (35:11):
PC or Mac?
Mario Rodera (35:13):
Mac. I converted the entire VRC to Mac, which I'm
very proud of, the VaccineResearch Center, because
primarily because of but alsobecause of other things. I'm
slowly back. I'm fully
Peter O'Toole (35:28):
That's because Flowjo used to be Mac
only, didn't it? And then
Mario Rodera (35:32):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (35:34):
Okay. McDonald's or Burger King?
Mario Rodera (35:38):
McDonald's. Their fries are much better.
Peter O'Toole (35:41):
Yeah. They really are, aren't they?
Mario Rodera (35:43):
Yes. They are.
Peter O'Toole (35:44):
Yeah. Tea or coffee?
Mario Rodera (35:48):
Oh, tea. Oh. I don't understand coffee. I'm a
beer supertaster, so I don'tdrink coffee and I don't drink
beer, so I drink tea and wine. Ifeel like a left hander in the
beverage world.
Peter O'Toole (36:02):
I love that analogy. That's really cool.
Chocolate or cheese?
Mario Rodera (36:07):
You know, I'll come back to that in a sec, but
in a sec. But I remember myfirst ISAC meeting was actually
in Cambridge in 1986 or '7 orso. And I thought, finally, I'm
gonna go to Cambridge, the homeof the tea drinkers. I'll able
to have tea easily enough. Andso the very first breakfast, we
(36:29):
sat down in a big hall there,and they were serving coffee. I
said, can I get some tea? And Ihad to go in the back room and
get some tea for me. And it'sjust because it was so the
meeting with by by non nonBritish people is primarily
coffee, but I thought I was sodisappointed by the fact that I
was being served coffee in myfirst trip to Britain as a
(36:50):
scientist.
Peter O'Toole (36:53):
That's brilliant. Chocolate or cheese? Okay. I'll
give you e. What what's yourflavor?
Mario Rodera (37:03):
Cheese in general. I love cheese, so but I like
chocolate too. But cheese, Ithink, is a little bit more
interesting in the long run.
Peter O'Toole (37:15):
Okay. What's your favorite food? If you could be
served any food, what would youlike to eat?
Mario Rodera (37:23):
Pizza.
Peter O'Toole (37:24):
Oh, okay. You can't just stop at pizza. What
topping?
Mario Rodera (37:28):
Oh, well, that would be my often favorite pizza
is sausage and green pepper.
Peter O'Toole (37:33):
Okay. Definitely a pepper pepper pepperoni.
Pepperoni fan definitely.Pepperoni.
Mario Rodera (37:40):
I'm probably pepperoni a bit salty. So
Peter O'Toole (37:44):
Yeah. I like the smokiness. If you get a nice
smoky pepperoni Yeah.
Mario Rodera (37:47):
That if you get if you that's the standard
pepperoni that all the Americanpizza chains use, but if you get
good pepperoni, then absolutely.
Peter O'Toole (37:57):
That that's a good choice for a favorite food.
And what about your leastfavorite food? What is your food
nightmare?
Mario Rodera (38:04):
You know, I grew up in a my mother was German,
and so I grew up not allowed tohave unfavored foods. But,
primarily, the things I wouldeat are are the the really
bitter foods like brusselssprouts. It's about the only
food stuff that I will not eat.
Peter O'Toole (38:21):
That well, that that that that there goes a
classic Christmas British dinnerthat always has brussels sprouts
on the plate.
Mario Rodera (38:28):
Well, I have to say I've had brussels sprouts
that were very good andtolerable, but they have to be
very caramelized.
Peter O'Toole (38:34):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (38:34):
They to be cooked and caramelized very heavily,
and then and then they'rethey're tolerable for me, and I
kinda like them.
Peter O'Toole (38:40):
Yeah. Chopped up nicely fried, caramelized. Yeah.
Okay. Get it?
Put fried. Do you prefer to eatin or eat out?
Mario Rodera (38:50):
I always prefer to eat in. It's a good food.
Peter O'Toole (38:54):
That you're lucky you said that because you
already said it's your wife thatcooks. And if you'd have said
eat out, she'd have gotten madat you for saying that.
Mario Rodera (39:03):
No. But for example, when I when I invite
myself over to my boss and hiswife are very good friends of
mine, I I always prefer to eatin because they're both very
good cooks.
Peter O'Toole (39:16):
Being as you don't do much cooking, do you do
the cleaning?
Mario Rodera (39:21):
Of course. That's only fair.
Peter O'Toole (39:25):
I I agree. That's why I prefer to cook because I
can't stand cleaning. TV orbook?
Mario Rodera (39:36):
Nowadays, it's TV. I haven't heard of book in
years.
Peter O'Toole (39:39):
Okay. And do you watch do you watch any trashy
TV?
Mario Rodera (39:45):
You mean what's my
Peter O'Toole (39:48):
Yeah. What's your TV sin?
Mario Rodera (39:51):
Not really. The only the only thing I do, I tend
to overwatch the reruns of ofold shows like friends and how I
met your mother and so on.
Peter O'Toole (40:03):
Okay.
Mario Rodera (40:04):
But I do like to stream the latest series on
Apple TV or so on Netflix.
Peter O'Toole (40:12):
And what about your favorite film? Favorite
movie?
Mario Rodera (40:17):
There are so many. It depends on what what choice,
but being there with Peterwhat's his name? It's it's based
on a novel by Jersey Kaczynski.It's one of my favorite movies
called Being There.
Peter O'Toole (40:34):
Okay.
Mario Rodera (40:34):
Came out in the mid eighties. It's a fabulous
movie. It's about, basically Ithought it used to predict the
rise of George Bush junior. Butin fact, now I think it's the
rise of Trump that was predictedby that.
Peter O'Toole (40:49):
That that could be worth a worth a watch,
actually. And I think anyonewho's watching or listening to
this may now be scrambling towatch it because it sounds
fascinating. Are you a Star Warsor Star Trek fan?
Mario Rodera (41:03):
Both.
Peter O'Toole (41:04):
If you had to choose one?
Mario Rodera (41:05):
Star Wars.
Peter O'Toole (41:07):
Oh, yeah. I think majority. And what about
favorite Christmas movie?
Mario Rodera (41:18):
I'm not a fan of the holiday movies, but probably
else.
Peter O'Toole (41:23):
Okay. That's quite popular too. Spectral or
compensation?
Mario Rodera (41:30):
Same thing.
Peter O'Toole (41:33):
Come on. One's additive. One's subtractive.
Mario Rodera (41:36):
No. No. It's exactly the same math.
Peter O'Toole (41:43):
I we'll argue that one is a different time.
But how can I argue it with you?Okay. So you
Mario Rodera (41:49):
can special well, specialized is the way that's
the future and how you have todo it. And the the data is much
you get much better resolutionthan spectral, but there's
really no difference betweenspectral and compensation.
Mathematically, the equivalent.
Peter O'Toole (42:08):
Fluorochromes or metal tags?
Mario Rodera (42:11):
Oh, very definitely fluorochromes. You
can't sort with metal tags. Andthat was that was was was some
funny. He said you'll never getany cells. We can't do anything
with them if you tag the metalsand and blend them up in a 4,000
degree oven.
Peter O'Toole (42:30):
What's your favorite music?
Mario Rodera (42:34):
Eighties.
Peter O'Toole (42:35):
Eighties? Okay. And what's your favorite color?
Mario Rodera (42:39):
Purple.
Peter O'Toole (42:40):
Of all the people, I thought you might say
PE or FITC or Rhodamine. No.Purple.
Mario Rodera (42:51):
I can give you the waveguide if you want.
Peter O'Toole (42:53):
Sorry?
Mario Rodera (42:54):
I can give you the wave length.
Peter O'Toole (42:56):
Oh, go on. What's your favorite wave length?
Mario Rodera (42:58):
Maybe about four seventy.
Peter O'Toole (43:03):
I that's a really good quote. I really like that
that. You gotta get a t shirtmade before seventy on it. Why
470?
Mario Rodera (43:12):
I don't know. Why buying anything. I I was
gonna I sous vide a lot when forfor cooking meat, And so I I
know the temperatures that Iwant different meats that that I
want with my sous vide. And Iwent to a restaurant that very
proudly said, we sous vide allour meats. And they said, well,
what temperature do want? I gavehim a I said one thirty one. He
(43:34):
said, I don't know what that is.He said, do want me rare or
rare? I said, oh, you youadvertise that you can you do it
to whatever temperature I want.And so, you know, this is kind
of disappointing to me that theyadvertise it as you could name
the temperature, but didn'texpect people to actually name
the temperature.
Peter O'Toole (43:55):
Yeah. I and I guess I well, you are you said
what wavelength, so I I guess Idid walk you into that. Do you
have any pet hates? Things youreally dislike, people's habits
you dislike? Or what do you findquite where is your tolerance
quite low on?
Mario Rodera (44:14):
Too many to list.
Peter O'Toole (44:16):
Sorry?
Mario Rodera (44:17):
Too many to list. My my primary pet peeve is
people who don't try. You know,it's not it's not making a
mistake or it's not, you know,doing doing something wrong.
It's when you haven't eventried.
Peter O'Toole (44:34):
So for all your lab that are listening to this
back, there you are. Make sureyou're putting in an effort
because otherwise, you're notgonna be happy with them.
Overall, your career, do youhave any regrets?
Mario Rodera (44:50):
No.
Peter O'Toole (44:52):
No?
Mario Rodera (44:55):
No. I can't. I've been very, very fortunate
throughout my career in thechoices I ended up with. Mhmm.
And, I can't say that it wouldcould have trust me better or
differently.
Peter O'Toole (45:10):
And if you could do any job for a day or a week,
not science, what job would youchoose to do?
Mario Rodera (45:22):
That's a great question. Imagine being
president of The United Statesto be a part of feeling you've
got to do it for one day.
Peter O'Toole (45:36):
Mhmm. As I say, you kinda you kinda need it for
a week, don't you, to get aproper flavor and then and then
and then cut and run?
Mario Rodera (45:43):
Yeah. Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (45:45):
That's cool. Ah, so if you were president for a
day or a week, what would youdo?
Mario Rodera (45:50):
Oh, that's easy. I've got the defense spending in
half, and I'd apply it to NIHbudget and to science.
Peter O'Toole (46:00):
I I I like the the dedication to science
itself. What is a what do youthink has given you most reward
at work? Has it been the thefounding of FlowJo and just how
many people have used it? Is itthe all the different multicolor
panels that people have pickedup and run with and be pushing
(46:22):
the limits of multicolor flowcytometry, or has it been your
latest developments in lookingat the disease and going So what
I'm thinking
Mario Rodera (46:31):
of is I enable science, and that's been my
greatest pleasure and honor isto be able to enable science at
many different levels, level oftechnology, at the level of
biology, at the training people.And, really, you know, there are
a couple of small things thatgave me great joy. It's like
(46:51):
when somebody asks a question onthe Purdue list about
compensation, and somebody elseanswers it absolutely correctly.
And that is in great joy nowthat it's you know, I've taught
people about compensation orspell or correction, whatever
you wanna call it. And there'senough people out there that
know how to teach it to otherpeople now.
Peter O'Toole (47:12):
Yeah. I I think
Mario Rodera (47:13):
But in fact, that's why I rarely respond on
the Purdue list. I used torespond all the time. But now
that other people respond, and Ithink that's really my joy is
that the that the I think thenext generation has taken up the
harness and and taken up the theefforts, and they're doing a
great great job of it.
Peter O'Toole (47:33):
I do see you reply sometimes still. So what
triggers
Mario Rodera (47:38):
Mostly pithy, and I try to inject a little humor.
Which some people don't findvery humorous, but my my sense
of humor can be very exciting.
Peter O'Toole (47:50):
That's a I think a wise head as well and be
knowing how to use it. And,actually, by not by not
commenting, you're letting otherpeople build up their
reputations.
Mario Rodera (48:00):
Exactly. Seeing my trainees, you know, become
successful on their own, right,has been a great journey too.
Raising a child that goes anddoes something great.
Peter O'Toole (48:13):
Any thoughts on social media?
Mario Rodera (48:18):
Yeah. It's the I mean, it's it's the it's really
coming, and it's absolutelynecessary. The problem is
identifying what is thetruthiness of the of the social
media is what's at stake here.Right? And that's a real
(48:39):
problem, but nobody knows.There's so much social media
that all that a lot of it isjust not correct that you're
saturate. I hope people willfinally get to the point where
they stop relying on socialmedia for their input, but I
suspect that it'll always bethere'll always be too many
people that get theirinformation from Twitter or or
(49:00):
whatever.
Peter O'Toole (49:01):
There's a lot of good science on social media.
Whichever platform that you'relooking at, whether it be
LinkedIn or Twitter or Blue Skyor whichever one, I think
there's some good scientificcommunities out there. I noticed
I I looked at you on socialmedia, and I found two Mario's
on Twitter. One which I think isgenuinely you, another one that
(49:24):
is at facts god.
Mario Rodera (49:27):
That's probably me too.
Peter O'Toole (49:29):
That's brilliant. I saw that. I thought so wanted
to have loads of activitiesinstead of facts god. And then I
saw the other one that has moreactivity, which is at Mario
Roader. But that that was abrilliant name, and I thought
that was a beautiful as one
Mario Rodera (49:43):
of the I found it and and registered it for myself
so somebody else wouldn't getit.
Peter O'Toole (49:49):
I I think it's one of the gods of glaze
cytometry. It's a really goodname. But but then you might
have to share it with god one,god two, god three.
Mario Rodera (49:58):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (50:00):
A few of you that's out there. Before I
finish, do you have any words ofwisdom for any young scientists
out there or even any olderscientists out there?
Mario Rodera (50:14):
Yeah. Share what you're doing. One of the things
that Len taught me was to bevery collaborative and to always
talk about what you're doing.Don't withhold information and
data. The science will proceedmuch more rapidly. Everyone is
so intent on taking ownership orsomething so that everyone knows
that they did it. And that's notreally what science is about.
(50:37):
Science is about sharing anddoing it collaboratively, and
you'll get recognized anyway.But I I remember being
absolutely horrified becauseGlenn would give a talk
sometimes, and he told he toldeveryone about the data I
collected a week or two before,which which I thought was pretty
hot data. And and now he'sspilling out to the entire
(50:58):
world. And I thought, oh,they're gonna run with it and
take it away. And that neverhappened. But what did happen
was that people wanted to startcollaborating with Len or or
been with me and wanted to workwith me. And I've been extremely
fortunate to have had a wholeslew of very, very productive
collaborations in my in my life.And if you look at my
(51:18):
publication history, I have,like, 400 papers or so. And I
would say a vast majority,probably 80% were collaborations
that came out. Only about 20%are from my own lab, or only
from my lab.
Peter O'Toole (51:33):
But of those 400 publications, I think it's got a
h index of over 100, I think.And if to those who don't know
what that means, that means itis phenomenally high compared to
almost all academics. To be overa hundred is a stellar
performance. And I also noticedyou in the Stanford University
Invention Hall of Fame. Yeah.That's pretty impressive.
Mario Rodera (51:56):
That's for science seven PE or science seven ABC,
which made Stanford about10,000,000 in royalties.
Peter O'Toole (52:05):
Do you get some of those royalties yourself?
Mario Rodera (52:07):
I did for a while.
Peter O'Toole (52:09):
That's nice, isn't it? That that's super
cool. And I have to ask one morequestion, which I nearly forgot.
Your dad was a physicist. Yourbrother was a neurobiologist.
You've gone to from biophysicsinto biology as well. What about
your son?
Mario Rodera (52:28):
About what? My son?
Peter O'Toole (52:29):
Yeah.
Mario Rodera (52:30):
He's defending his PhD in virology at Harvard in
two weeks.
Peter O'Toole (52:34):
Oh, wow. So he's also following the same
footsteps?
Mario Rodera (52:37):
Yeah. But he doesn't want to do science. He
wants to go to a startup companyor do business development.
Okay. Yeah.
Peter O'Toole (52:47):
But you have the company, so that's not so
dissimilar. He's just Oh,
Mario Rodera (52:52):
he just wants to start there. I did not start
there.
Peter O'Toole (52:54):
Yeah. Okay. But I guess he's seeing what you can
do with the company as wellthrough that.
Mario Rodera (53:00):
Exactly.
Peter O'Toole (53:00):
Oh, I I hope his defense goes well into
Mario Rodera (53:03):
Oh, so too.
Peter O'Toole (53:05):
And, Mario, thank you so much for joining me
today. Thank you to everyonewho's listened or watched, and
please, you can see PaulRobinson and some of the other
people we've talked about, andyou'll see Dave Novo up and
coming if you're watching thisas he's just released. But,
Mario, on behalf of thecommunity, thank you so much for
being an inspiration to us.Thank you for helping lead and
(53:29):
develop and giving us the toolsthat we are also dependent on
and just take for granted inmany cases. And I hope you
realize just how big an impactyou've had on the cytometry
market, and thank you for takingyour time to join me today.
Mario Rodera (53:42):
It's been a real pleasure, and thank you for
saying that. Those are very nicethings.
Peter O'Toole (53:47):
Thank you.
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Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.