Padmini Rangamani, assistant professor in the department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), grew up in Hyderabad, India. As a child she enjoyed writing poetry and embroidering and thought she might study literature or needlecraft. Then she decided that she wanted to work helping homeless and aging populations. “Now, as it was then, I can easily get interested in a variety of things,” she shares. “You’ll see that in my training choices — I’ve gone wherever I’ve gotten the most curious.”
In high school her interests led her toward science and math, with the influence of a good teacher. “In India, you often choose to pursue engineering or medicine at the end of high school. I remember having a major dilemma: do I give up math to study medicine or do I give up biology to study engineering?” she says. “I remember telling my mom that I dreamt that math told me not to betray it and that’s how I went into engineering.”
Rangamani attended the College of Technology, Osmania University, in Hyderabad and obtained her bachelor’s degree in 2001 in chemical engineering. She then went to Georgia Institute of Technology and obtained a master’s degree in chemical engineering before beginning her PhD studies in systems biology in the lab of Ravi Iyengar at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
“When I was training as a chemical engineer, reaction engineering and transport phenomena were my favorite subjects. Then, I saw that signal transduction can be thought of as reaction engineering in different geometries and this was the focus of my PhD,” she explains. “This area [of research] is probably best described as `Systems Biophysics’ and I got into this thanks to my PhD and postdoctoral advisors and mentors.”
Towards the end of her PhD, Rangamani became very interested in membrane curvature. “I decided that I needed to understand how thin materials bend and curve. My postdoc with Professor George Oster at the University of California, Berkeley, was focused on lipid bilayer mechanics. Working with George was eye-opening for me in the way he thought about physics and biology,” she says. “I also worked very closely with David Steigmann at Berkeley at this time. He has been instrumental in mentoring me in differential geometry and mathematics.”
In 2014, after her postdoc, Rangamani began her position at UCSD. “Current projects in the lab are focused on integrating spatial models of signaling with mechanics, with an emphasis on dendritic spines. We are also working on developing models of non-canonical signaling, particularly with respect to cancer,” she shares.
The most challenging aspect of her career in biophysics has been inherent to the field itself. “I think the biggest challenge has been balancing mathematics and computation with biology. Since the interdisciplinary field is so young and old at the same time, it can be quite a challenge to exchange technical information meaningfully. It’s something that we continue to struggle with,” she says.
Despite the challenges of working in an interdisciplinary field, her career in biophysics has been rewarding. “My favorite thing about biophysics is how laws of physics apply at the smallest scale and we can use them to explore, investigate, and understand heretofore unexplored cellular mechanisms,” Rangamani shares. “Technically, the most rewarding aspect of my work is when the model predictions match the experimental data. Honestly, it’s a high like no other. Professionally, the most rewarding aspect of my work is working with my trainees and watching them develop in their careers.”
Going forward, she hopes to develop models that combine mechanics and signaling to explain complex biological processes. “We are currently starting work on dendritic spines that I think will lead to the development of new mathematics, new computational tools, and the results from simulations can be closely compared to experiments,” she says. “I want to keep pushing the boundaries of spatial modeling in cellular processes and comparisons between models and experiments.”
Past Biophysical Society president Suzanne Scarlata, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, met Rangamani in 2009 when she was a PhD student. Since then, the two have collaborated on several projects. “Padmini is a theoretician interested in cell signaling and I am an experimentalist interested in signaling, and so we have a great, synergistic relationship,” she says. “We have collaborated on studies to understand the role of cell shape in organizing signaling components and are now trying to understand how these shape effects play a role in neurite contractions. It really has been an exciting interaction!”
“I always thought that modeling was simply to explain experimental data, but Padmini has taught me how much novel information and behavior can be derived from models,” Scarlata shares. “Padmini treats her collaborators with total respect. She is very thoughtful and is interested in the science without personality or ego issues. When you talk to Padmini you know she has done her homework and will have a lot to contribute to the project.”
Morgan Chabanon, a postdoc in Rangamani’s lab, has also been impressed with her depth of knowledge. “She is not only extremely competent in mathematics and theoretical membrane mechanics, but has a wide knowledge of the latest experimental literature. Whenever I come to her with a question or an idea, she will not only direct me to relevant theoretical or modeling papers, but she will also enumerate from the top of her head which experimental groups and which experimental papers I should look up,” he says.
“Whenever we get stuck on something, she will email me a dozen papers, a couple of book chapters, and pages of hand-written derivations, before I even have time to finish my coffee.”
Rangamani has taken the lead of her former advisor in how she mentors her students and postdocs. “I’ve always admired George Oster for his work and ability to see past biological complexity to get to the crux of the issue. He has also been an inspiration in how to mentor students and in his day-today interactions with members of his group. He was just never too busy for scientific discussions,” she says.
This has not gone unnoticed by Chabanon. “If we meet in the morning, she always notices if I have low caffeine blood level, and takes me for coffee. Although that’s partly because she’s also a coffee addict,” he explains, “I think it’s a way for her to honor one of the people she admires the most — George Oster, her own postdoc advisor — who used to take her for coffee in difficult times.”
Though Scarlata and Chabanon both note how quickly Rangamani responds to emails and how little sleep she seems to need, she is also protective of time with her family. “Almost any day of the week, any time, she will answer emails in less than five minutes,” Chabanon says, “except from 4:30 PM to 8:00 PM. That is family time and it is sacred to her.” In what free time remains after work and family, she also trains for and runs half marathons and enjoys knitting.
Rangamani advises biophysics students and trainees, “Find problems that excite you -- the hours are too long and the work is too hard for you not to be passionate about it. Another thing I think is important is to remember to focus. There are simply too many distractions online these days and these can become rabbit holes. Basically, learn the difference between working hard and simply working long days.”