Valérie Hilgers
“… it’s okay to mess up.”
Valérie Hilgers is a two-time ERC grantee and group leader at the MPI-IE. Her lab aims to understand how the immense complexity within neurons does not end in chaos, but instead translates into specialized function. In this interview, she reflects on the perfect time to have children in science and argues why it is okay to mess up from time to time.
What is the focus of your research?
Basically, our research is all about figuring out how our genes and epigenetics shape brain function and what happens when things go wrong in disease. The nervous system is incredibly complex, with neurons using genes in highly specialized ways, and me and my team want to understand how this complexity leads to precise function instead of chaos. In most cases, an overwhelming variety of molecular interactions could lead to disorder, but in neurons, it results in precise, functional order. This is the core aspect driving our research, with a particular focus on RNA mechanisms. We are looking at how different RNAs are made, how they interact with proteins, and how they move within neurons. Unlike many studies that zero in on specific diseases, we take a broader approach by uncovering fundamental mechanisms in the nervous system that could later be used to tackle different neurological disorders.
Can you describe how your team looks like and what is important for you when leading a team of a scientists?
My team is somewhat unconventional in its structure at the moment because all our projects are led by PhD students. In addition, I have a lab manager and a technician who support the projects. But I do not have Postdocs leading projects. As a result, the expertise is entirely carried by PhD students, which means they take on more responsibility. Without that extra layer of postdocs, there is a greater intellectual burden on them – but also a greater opportunity for growth. So, I supervise the PhD students closely, especially in the beginning and over time they gain responsibility and start making independent decisions. This approach, which I will keep when Postdocs join the lab, works great for really talented people who take on project responsibility and really think about a lot about their project. And this is how you get a first-author paper because it means they have led their own project, contributed to designing experiments, conducted most of them, and taken responsibility for coordinating the team’s efforts. While many people contribute to a project, the project leading PhD student should be the one ensuring everything stays on track. When then things finally come together, it’s incredibly rewarding.
Are there any key learnings from your time as PhD student you transferred into now that help your team members?
One thing is to let students know that it’s okay to mess up. We all do. In fact, I consider myself a master at messing up, and I like to entertain my lab with stories of my own disasters. Like the time I cut myself and accidentally poured radioactive material on the wound. I even set myself on fire. Twice. Oh, and I set the lab on fire once. Thankfully, only once. Or when I dropped a bottle of phenol on the floor and the entire building had to be evacuated. The list goes on. I share these stories to make sure my students feel safe coming to me when they mess up. You don’t have to be proud of your mistakes, but you do have to acknowledge them, fix them, and ideally, learn from them.
What inspired you in the first few years to become a scientist? Was it always clear to you?
I’m not one of those naturally inspired people. In school, I was good at many subjects and interested in a lot of different things. In the end, my decision was actually quite pragmatic. Since I had so many interests, I thought about which ones I could still pursue as hobbies and which required a professional setting. I realized that I could always do sports or read books on philosophy and literature. But I couldn’t do science as a hobby. I couldn’t just set up a lab at home and start running experiments. So, I decided to study something that would give me access to something unique – something I couldn’t do outside of a professional environment. That led me to biology. I also considered physics and mathematics, but I was more interested in understanding how cells work.
You had your kids while being a Postdoc. Is it a good phase to have kids?
The timing is never perfect. But having kids during my postdoc was a terrible idea. But somehow, it turned out okay… even though it almost didn’t. (laughs) If I had complete freedom of choice, no concerns and all the what-ifs, I would have waited until I was a PI to have children. That said, for a woman in academia, it’s an incredibly tough decision. There were a few factors that helped me, things I hadn’t even considered at the time. For example, doing my postdoc in the U.S. was a major advantage. I hadn’t realized how difficult it would be to continue experimental work while pregnant or nursing. If I had done my postdoc in Germany, that would have been it. In the US, whether you choose to continue working with hazardous chemicals, under safe conditions of course, is up to you. That flexibility turned out to be crucial for me. On the other side, daycare costs in the US are horrific especially in high-cost areas like Boston or the San Francisco Bay Area. But in my case, I was fortunate to have a European fellowship that provided fully paid maternity leave for three months. That was huge. Also, the German Research Foundation (DFG) helped as well, allowing me to convert parental allowance into funding that covered most childcare costs. That support made all the difference. So, in the end, it worked out not just because of good planning, but also because I happened to be in a situation where these resources were available to me.
You invite girls from school to your lab? Why is that important to you?
Well, I think girls generally have fewer opportunities or receive less encouragement to pursue STEM fields. It starts as early as kindergarten: boys get building blocks, while girls are given dolls or soft toys. It’s often not intentional, but it happens, and those early influences can be hard to undo later. Even with my own daughters, I can see this dynamic at play. There should be some pushback against these stereotypes. By actively creating opportunities for girls in the lab or sometimes even prioritizing them, I try to counteract these societal imbalances in a small way.
