Ivana Gadjanski, scientist - When biologist enters world of business

(Ivana Gadjanski)

At the moment when everybody was leaving Serbia, she returned. Although she obtained her PhD in neurophysiology at the prestigious German University Georg-August in Gottingen, she wants to share her knowledge with colleagues in Serbia. Even though she is a biologist, Ivana Gadjanski, apart from the academic career, has her own start up; she is starting the project from development of women entrepreneurship in Biotechnology Fab Lab, writes poetry and translates.

While she is organizing a conference for female entrepreneurship in biotechnology, Fab Forum" scheduled for September 21, Belgrade, Ivana Gadjanski in her interview for eKapija speaks about her childhood, education songs, “walls” she encounters….

Careless childhood in Karlovci

She was born in Novi Sad but she has never lived in this Vojvodina town. Although a majority of memories dates from Serbian capital, she is happy when she remembers her childhood and teenage period from Sremski Karlovci where she spent a majority of her childhood.

- My mother is from Sremski Karlovci so I spent my summers there. During my holiday at the Danube, I developed the touch for animals, river, nature – Ivana remembers and admits she later realized it was a deciding moment when love for biology was born.

Career as Jane Gudol

When she was coming back from her careless holidays to school, she did not have problem to commit to book and learning. She has always had affinity for natural sciences so she finished the Third Belgrade grammar school, natural sciences department.

She went in for general biology, although she had a sufficient score for molecular biology department, following her a bit of naïve idea that her career resembles a research of David Attenborough and a life with chimpanzees such as Jane Gudol.

Germany was not a promised country

We always encounter something unexpected in our lives. Thus, Ivana Gadjanski started her career far from vision of life in nature and got her first job in the laboratory of the Institute for Biological researches Sinisa Stankovic in Belgrade.

- At that time, a competition for scholarships in Gottingen in Germany was published so I applied and went to Germany for my PhD studies. I finished my PhD when I was 27 , then post PhD studies of neurophysiology and I worked at the same time at the Max Plank Institute for Biophysical chemistry – Ivana finished her PhD on multiple sclerosis in 2007.

She finished another PhD studies at the Institute for Clinical neuro-immunology at the University Ludwig Maximilian in Munich in 2008. At the moment when everything was indicating she will stay in Germany, she decided to return to Serbia. Despite the opinion of her environment, she sticks to her decision.

When she returned to Serbia, she worked at the state-owned institute in Novi Pazar and , as she says, work with students was a very interesting experience since that was one of the things she has always wanted to do. After that she went to New York-based Columbia Institute. She continued her career after her return at the Metropolitan University in Belgrade as a mentor on PhD studies while she deals with researches at the Institute for Bioengineering - BioIRC in Kragujevac with a group of scientists she appreciates.

Big Apple as Belgrade

Maybe a bit disappointed because basic researches in neuro science do not get an easy way in practice, Ivana decides to commit to regenerative medicine, stem cells and biomedical engineering. That was the reason for her further development in that field at the Columbia University, as a guest professor with Fulbright scholarship in the laboratory of Prof, Gordana Vunjak Novakovic, a member of SANU.

Business in the service of science

As she says, in America she started thinking in a new way, different from the one that people deal with “science for science’s sake”.

One of the ways to get a commercial product is a start up Ivana set up. She set up Pubsonic which enables faster and more efficient search of science literature.

Ivana’s entrepreneurial ideas did not stop with Pubsonic. Women in entrepreneurship is also something that keeps her attention. Thus, Forum for Women Entrepreneurship in Biotechnology– FabLab for which she got funding from Fulbright funds and where she cooperates with the American Embassy in Belgrade.

- I want to connect science and entrepreneurship because it is necessary and here it seems to be impossible. Although the world accepts it, here it is opposing. I am impatient to hear answers of other scientists to this idea – Ivana is speaking who does not support an opinion that someone is leaving science to run business.

Not only it is not so, but today it is even hard and impossible to function differently.

Fab Forum scheduled for September 21 in Belgrade is only a step in female entrepreneurship development. She received a call from the Science Promotion Center to take part at the First Regional Conference for Science Promotion in cooperation with UNESCO where she would present female entrepreneurship options while in December she should attend TEDx Belgrade Women event for which she has been licensed.

Standing shoulder to shoulder with Bill Gates and Steve Jobs

Ivana Gadjanski is the first person from Serbia who became a member of TEDGlobal Fellow program and the only representative from Serbia who gave a speech at the TED conference where Bill Gates and Steve Jobs participated before her.

When poetry tears down walls

In a speech “Poetry and scientific career” she recalls lines of Constantine Cavafiy who says “They built walls around me”. When asked whether walls were built around her, she answers:

- There are always walls that surround me, many of them, One of the walls is the one a number of “returnees” encounter. Everybody who decides to return from abroad after schooling must face acceptance of the environment so we have to invest additional efforts to prove we are not competitors but partners and with an objective to help our country.

She demolished these walls with writing poetry. These are, as she calls them, chimeras - a combination of a poem and a short story. She has published two books of her.

- I write ever since I know about myself. Not only do I find it amusing but my intuition speaks through my poems. When I looked at poems I wrote during my stay in Germany, I see I was not happy at that time, although I was convincing myself that I was – our collocutor who is planning to publish these collections in English, says.

She was awarded "Stražilovo" Brankovog kola in 2008.

Ivana’s parents were translating Greek poetry so she has a gift for languages and speaks English, German, French, Greek and she translated "Guide through Human Brain” by Susan Greenfield.

Mount Everest

Before she went to Germany, she was mountain-climbing. Although she neglected this love and has not had experience in high mountains, she is soon beginning preparations for climbing Mount Everest.

- On of the colleagues from TED is a top mountain climber and is planning to start TED-fellows group to climb Mount Everest in 2016. We are slowly starting with preparations and I should soon start exercises but I am not quite sure I will do it, it is necessary to set the limit after all somewhere – Ivana who enjoys adventure is speaking.

Commitments as challenge

She says it is not an easy thing to balance between her commitments, ambitions and then again, she has time for her friends, partners…Typical scientific, academic career and start up career do not oppose but it is difficult to make a balance. However, Ivana does not give up, she is enthusiastic and embraces new commitments.

- I am planning to do these jobs parallel as long as possible. If I do not succeed in committing to work in a lab, I want to participate in scientific projects. I would like to develop in academic career. I am planning to develop my startup company and writing is becoming my oasis – Ivana is talking about her business plans.

Ivana Gadjanski does not see these plans as obstacles but as challenges and when the time for family comes, it will be another challenge for her she will accept.

Irina Milosevic