Introducing Standard Deviation EP1: The Impossible Climb

Out of Patients with Matthew Zachary

This episode of Standard Deviation features Oliver Bogler in conversation with Dr Na Zhao, a cancer biologist caught in the crossfire of science, politics, and survival. Na’s life reads like a brutal lab experiment in persistence.

She grew up in China, lost her mother and aunt to breast cancer before she turned twelve, then came to the United States to chase science as both an immigrant and a survivor’s daughter. She worked two decades to reach the brink of independence as a cancer researcher, only to watch offers and grants vanish in the political chaos of 2025.

Oliver brings her story into sharp focus, tracing the impossible climb toward a tenure-track position and the human cost of a system that pulls the ladder up just as people like Na reach for it. This conversation pulls back the curtain on the NIH funding crisis, the toll on early-career scientists, and what happens when personal tragedy fuels professional ambition.

Listeners will walk away with a raw sense of how fragile the future of cancer research really is, and why people like Na refuse to stop climbing.

RELATED LINKS

• Dr Zhao at Baylor College of Medicine
• Dr Zhao on LinkedIn
• Dr Zhao's Science article
• Indirect Costs explained by US Congress

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