Welcome Message: Dr. Liane B. Russell

Dr. Liane B. Russell, a Senior Corporate Fellow at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), kicked off the eighth Women in Science and Technology conference by welcoming the students to ORNL and then describing her own experience in making a decision that many of the participants will face—choosing a scientific research area.

A member of the National Academy of Sciences and a recipient of numerous awards—including the Enrico Fermi Award—Russell's scientific contributions have been chiefly in the areas of basic mammalian genetics, mammalian mutagenesis, and teratogenesis. It was a college program that helped her zero in on this particular research field for her life's work.

"A summer research program during my sophomore year in college was the catalyst that got me fired up for research," Russell said. She described being able to observe a fertilized mouse egg, and it got her excited about doing research in genetics, which was a relatively young scientific area at the time. Today, research in this area is becoming increasingly valuable as researchers try to find more information about DNA, she added.

Russell said she came to ORNL because it was one of the only places at the time that would hire husband and wife research teams, and that she has enjoyed her career tremendously. She and her husband forged one of the largest animal (mouse) research facilities in the world and gained international prestige as investigators in mammalian genetics and mutagenesis. There is a great similarity with the human genome, and much of the Russell's work has contributed to advances in the study in human disorders and diseases. A major contribution by Liane was her hypothesis for the inactive X chromosome, which was subsequently confirmed.

As she closed her remarks, she encouraged the students to listen and learn from the conference speakers, all of whom have valuable information to share about forging a career in scientific and technical areas.

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