"Take Five" with MBL Director of Research Anne Sylvester

"Take Five" is an occasional feature in which we pose five questions to a Marine Biological Laboratory community member about their career, dreams, and passions. Here we profile MBL Director of Research Anne Sylvester.

Sylvester oversees the MBL’s research enterprise, including its resident laboratories, the Whitman Center, the Grass Laboratory, and other research activities on campus. She came to the MBL roughly 3.5 years ago from the National Science Foundation (NSF), where she served as a program director.  Previously, she was a professor at the University of Wyoming, where she directed a research program in maize development genetics and genomics and taught genetics, biochemistry, and plant development. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Washington, where she conducted research at the Friday Harbor Marine Laboratory, and completed postdoctoral fellowships in plant developmental biology at Stanford University and in maize developmental genetics at the University of California-Berkeley.

What are the responsibilities of the MBL’s Director of Research, and what do you most enjoy about your work?

I'll start with what I most enjoy: supporting the science happening here. My role here at the MBL is to facilitate the research of our resident faculty and the visiting scientists who come from all over the world. I would say my responsibilities are to support the funding efforts for our faculty, oversee the smooth running of the visiting programs, and facilitate communicating science both internally and with funders. I’m a scientist at the core, so it’s exciting to see discoveries being made and find ways to make the work environment more productive. I spent many hours myself on a microscope and in the field, so I get what is going on here and want to keep MBL supported and the discoveries coming.

You held multiple leadership positions prior to arriving at MBL, including at the National Science Foundation. Is there a project or program you worked on that you’re especially proud of?

My reason for going to NSF as a program director was essentially to explore the other side of science funding and policy. I had already moved up in administration at my home institution, and I wanted to give back to this agency that had supported my research projects for so many years. So, I became the director of the program that had funded me originally, the Plant Genome Research Program, and eventually also oversaw the Developmental Systems cluster, which had funded my research in leaf development. Those were golden years for the NSF, and I very much appreciated seeing the “big picture” of where science is and where it’s going. One of my favorite projects was working collaboratively with other U.S. federal agencies and international partners. I was very proud of helping to facilitate a funding arrangement with 10 countries and then overseeing a funding competition in Transatlantic Plant Science. Another favorite effort was starting to establish public-private partnerships in an effort called “Feeding the Planet Sustainably” — specifically related to supporting basic research in plant science that could positively impact agriculture and the environment.

You also had a research and teaching career as a professor at the University of Wyoming. What did your research focus on, and what interested you most about it?

My interests have never really changed since I was an undergraduate and the first thing that thrilled me was looking through a microscope at plankton: little animals and plants swimming around. My Ph.D. work was at the Friday Harbor Laboratories (FHL), a marine lab associated with the University of Washington. I did all of my research there, and it was transformative for me, just like MBL is for so many. After one week in the lab at FHL, I knew I wanted to stay in science forever. Plus, I met my husband there, which tends to happen in the intense environment of a marine lab.

As a grad student, I worked on a marine plant (a red alga) that has giant cells and very unusual cytoplasmic activity, movement, and growth. My question was: How does an organism start from a small, simple cell and acquire all of the traits that make it a final plant? This question essentially has never changed, but I wanted to understand the underlying genetics, so I switched from marine plants to maize (aka corn) for my postdoc: first going to Stanford and then University of California-Berkeley. And I spent the rest of my career trying to understand how the earliest-forming cells acquire the identity to make an entire corn leaf. What are the genes that control that process? Why is a corn leaf wide, rather than narrow like other grasses? How does it get that way? What are the traits that make the leaf bend out to capture sunlight? If you look at a corn plant, you see the flat leaf blades are bent out facing the sun in a structure that acts like a joint -- very adaptive for capturing light energy! I wanted to figure out how that joint works, and how it grows and develops. And this trait is hugely important for crop productivity with an impact on agriculture.

There are so many unanswered questions in biology that can ultimately impact society. If you work on a crop plant like corn to ask fundamental questions (like how the plant controls leaf shape and size), then you very quickly start thinking far down the road about how the answers will impact the crop and agriculture. This is another part of what I love about being at MBL: the fundamental questions being asked and tools being developed here lead to amazing research that has an impact on human health and disease, innovation, and the environment.

What accomplishments in your career or life have meant the most to you?

Other than my children? They are number one — along with my husband, who's also in science. We have two kids who are amazing, and somehow we managed it all. It was tricky, but that's one accomplishment (not mine alone!) that I am forever grateful for.

In my scientific career, I would say an accomplishment was developing imaging and genomic tools with collaborators that allowed us to define how maize leaves grow and identify specific genes that actually alter the angle of the joint. The corn lines we developed for imaging are standards and used by so many scientists now. It’s gratifying and exciting to see. Teaching was also super important to me, and I taught small and large classes. One important teaching experience (also a learning experience) was developing an educational exchange with a tribal college in Montana as part of our collaborative NSF grant: we would go to Little Big Horn College and work with students there, and they would come to my lab in Wyoming. This taught me a lot about the value of relevant hands-on science.

My maize and other scientific colleagues mean a lot to me. So many outstanding scientists have been really great collaborators, friends and colleagues all these years. I still go to the Annual Maize Genetics Conference each year (for more years than you want to know). They keep asking if we can grow corn in the ocean yet!

And becoming Director of Research at the MBL has meant a lot to me!

What are your goals for 2025, either personal or professional?

We're in a difficult time for the institution. The MBL, in all of its years, has had ups and downs. I think we have some tough challenges now, some of which are out of our control. I am a realistic optimist, so my goal is to share hope, keep our discovery science alive, try to keep things as stable as possible, think to the future, and make the best decisions we can without compromising our values. So, my professional goals are to facilitate this and see MBL get stronger, not splintered, through 2025. Personally, my goals for 2025 are to stay healthy, exercise more, and try something new this year. I’d love to get on a microscope again!